{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/5783", "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": 5783, "subject": "academic commentary", "messages": 87, "voices": 17, "first": "2010-11-29T01:46:25+00:00", "last": "2011-01-18T06:45:30+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "<4CF305F1.90905@sky.com>", "from": { "name": "Jane Delawney", "address": "jane_delawney at sky.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T01:46:25+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Just a quick enquiry as to whether any other lister has read David \nWright's 'Attending Daedalus' which is an expansion upon the author's \nPh.D thesis and was published by Liverpool University Press, UK, in 2003.\n\nInteresting volume, a full on academic study of mythopoesis and \ndeception (both on GW's part, and, within the fiction, on the part of \nthe Hierogrammates) in BoTNS / UoTNS. The author (Wright, that is) \nappears convinced that the religious and mythic elements many perceive \nin BoTNS and its 'relatives' are all part of classic Wolfean \nmisdirection, and that these themes in fact disguise an elaborate \nself-interested scam on behalf of the Hierogrammates.\n\nSeems to me on a first reading that Wright has (a) overlooked a pivotal \nmoment in UoTNS where the relationship & balance of power between \nTzadkiel and Severian are both subverted - turned upon their heads \nindeed - within the space of one single short paragraph; and also that \n(b) he has not taken into account the way things might appear to beings \nwho are not bound by our linear perception of time.\n\nYmmv of course! If any of you have read this work I'd be most interested \nto hear your comments.\n\ncheers\n\njd" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF365BD.8090208@io.com>", "from": { "name": "Jeff Wilson", "address": "jwilson at io.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T08:35:09+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF305F1.90905@sky.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/28/2010 7:46 PM, Jane Delawney wrote:\nThe author (Wright, that is)\nappears convinced that the religious and mythic elements many perceive\nin BoTNS and its 'relatives' are all part of classic Wolfean\nmisdirection, and that these themes in fact disguise an elaborate\nself-interested scam on behalf of the Hierogrammates." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "He effectively says the \"evil does the work of the Increate, too\" meme \nwas planted by the Yesodis?" }, { "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": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T12:16:44+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF365BD.8090208@io.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Jeff WIlson- He effectively says the \"evil does the work of the Increate, too\" meme \nwas planted by the Yesodis?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nYeah, that's my gathering. I think Wright analyzes BotNS from an atheistic perspective.\nSo there is no truly higher spiritual power involved. Just some highly advanced aliens\nwho play Severian and humanity like a fiddle.\n \nJane I think I remember which short paragraph it was in which \"the relationship & balance \nof power between Tzadkiel and Severian are both subverted - turned upon their heads \nindeed\". Is it where Tzadkiel confesses to being an acolyte to Severian in a different\nuniverse or something like that?\n \nSort of similar to the reversal we see where Barbatus and Famulimus, so tall and beautiful \nand from a giant spaceship, take a knee and bow before scruffy Severian.\n \nMy impression is that Wright interprets BotNS from an atheist point of view because he is,\nhimself a devout atheist and perhaps unwilling to acknowledge spirituality in the work of\nan author he so admires, despite awareness of Wolfe's religious leanings.\n \n \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<964735.56099.qm@web37604.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T15:55:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "To be fair, I don't think Wright's central thesis is that BotNS is atheistic. Or \nrather, that's certainly where he ends up, but I don't think he's primarily \ngiving a theological (or a-theological) reading.\n\nInstead, he's concerned with how Wolfe uses intertextuality (both with other \nactual books and you might say \"internal\" intertextual) to create the experience \nof creating and confounding reader expectations. That's something we all know, \nand what ultimately makes his book not all that controversial, I'd think. We all \nknow that reading Wolfe with an eye to a kind of \"second text\" that lies \nunderneath the apparent story is standard operating procedure for a Wolfe book. \nWright just tries to lay out a sort of general methodology for doing that with \nWolfe.\n\nThat said, his primary example is that BotNS *appears* to be a story of Severian \nliving out a kind of spiritual Christ-figure story. But, as Lee said, Wright \nthen shows how there's the second text of the \"aliens who play Severian and \nhumanity like a fiddle.\" That's the atheistic view. And it's certainly there as \na possibility, one that has been mentioned many times, and, I think, most close \nreaders of BotNS accept this Wolfe presents this as one possible, even if \nincomplete, explanation of the larger story a number of times in the story. It \nalso seems like a step one has to go through when interpreting the text.\n\nThe problem, as I see it, is that Wright pretty much stops there. Many people, \nand Wolfe included, I would think, want to say that there's yet a third \"text\" \nwhich is the story of how the Hierodules are still carrying out a divine plan, \neven if they think they're just manipulating everything else. That's the idea \nwe've hashed out so often in this list where \"evil\" turns out to be used for \n\"good,\" etc. Ultimately, I think that Wright's sense of how Wolfe manipulates a \nreader's expectations with stories-within-stories still fits this \ninterpretation.\n\nIn other words, Wright is ultimately giving a methodological reading of Wolfe. \nAnd it's one that I think a majority of readers would agree with. But his \nprimary interpretive example just doesn't go far enough, even on his own terms.\n\nThis is particularly problematic when he gets to Long Sun. It seems to me that \nLong Sun makes it patently clear from the beginning that what we're going to see \nis how true revelation, Silk's vision, has to be understood through a \"fallen\" \nmythology. That seems to be the entire stated point of Long Sun, especially \ngiven the relative directness of the first chapter compared to the opening of \nBotNS. But Wright largely ignores this and, instead, focuses on how Pas has \ncreated a false religion. That entire part of his book just seemed clumsy to me \nas if he was blatantly ignoring aspects of other books that would complicate \nwhat came before.\n\nI'm also a bit mystified about why Wright took the angle he did when Wolfe has \nbeen so straightforward about his own religious beliefs. Wright just never \naddresses it. Granted, not every book that Wolfe writes has to be completely \nconsistent with his own beliefs. One can make stuff up and lie in fiction, after \nall. But, if I recall correctly, Wright never even addresses why Wolfe, a \nbeliever, might have written a book that, according to Wright, is all about how \nbeliefs are ultimately lies.\n\nAnyway...I learned a lot from Wright's book, even if I found it incredibly \nfrustrating at times. Like I said, I think he's good as far as he goes, but he's \nonly finished half of the job. He needs to go further and ask himself how his \nown interpretation could itself still be an \"artifice\" (his term) used to \ndeceive the reader and make him think and read even more closely.\n\n\n\n\n----- Original Message ----" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "From: Lee Berman \nTo: urth at lists.urth.net\nSent: Mon, November 29, 2010 6:16:44 AM\nSubject: (urth) academic commentary\nJeff WIlson- He effectively says the \"evil does the work of the Increate, too\" \nmeme \n\nwas planted by the Yesodis?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yeah, that's my gathering. I think Wright analyzes BotNS from an atheistic \nperspective.\nSo there is no truly higher spiritual power involved. Just some highly advanced \naliens\nwho play Severian and humanity like a fiddle.\n\nJane I think I remember which short paragraph it was in which \"the relationship \n& balance \n\nof power between Tzadkiel and Severian are both subverted - turned upon their \nheads \n\nindeed\". Is it where Tzadkiel confesses to being an acolyte to Severian in a \ndifferent\nuniverse or something like that?\n\nSort of similar to the reversal we see where Barbatus and Famulimus, so tall and \nbeautiful \n\nand from a giant spaceship, take a knee and bow before scruffy Severian.\n\nMy impression is that Wright interprets BotNS from an atheist point of view \nbecause he is,\nhimself a devout atheist and perhaps unwilling to acknowledge spirituality in \nthe work of\nan author he so admires, despite awareness of Wolfe's religious leanings.\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF3D13D.1020405@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-11-29T16:13:49+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<964735.56099.qm@web37604.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well argued, Craig.\n\nYes, I think Wolfe is deep enough as a Catholic and an author to be able \nto weave into his narratives all sorts of apparently contradictory \nprinciples. I could begin with the reader's---at least the naive \nreader's---necessary movement from \"Narration is truth\" to \"Narration is \nlies\" and ultimately to \"Narration that is lies is also truth, maybe \neven a better truth.\"\n\nReplace \"narration\" with \"belief,\" and consider that Wolfe had a long \npath of conversion to Catholicism, and you have your 3 texts as well as \na motivation for Wolfe to \"create\" such a long and complicated tale.\n\nThanks for the Wright summary. It does seem odd that he did all this \nwork but could not make the final leap." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/29/2010 10:55 AM, Craig Brewer wrote:\nTo be fair, I don't think Wright's central thesis is that BotNS is atheistic. Or\nrather, that's certainly where he ends up, but I don't think he's primarily\ngiving a theological (or a-theological) reading.\n\nInstead, he's concerned with how Wolfe uses intertextuality (both with other\nactual books and you might say \"internal\" intertextual) to create the experience\nof creating and confounding reader expectations. That's something we all know,\nand what ultimately makes his book not all that controversial, I'd think. We all\nknow that reading Wolfe with an eye to a kind of \"second text\" that lies\nunderneath the apparent story is standard operating procedure for a Wolfe book.\nWright just tries to lay out a sort of general methodology for doing that with\nWolfe.\n\nThat said, his primary example is that BotNS *appears* to be a story of Severian\nliving out a kind of spiritual Christ-figure story. But, as Lee said, Wright\nthen shows how there's the second text of the \"aliens who play Severian and\nhumanity like a fiddle.\" That's the atheistic view. And it's certainly there as\na possibility, one that has been mentioned many times, and, I think, most close\nreaders of BotNS accept this Wolfe presents this as one possible, even if\nincomplete, explanation of the larger story a number of times in the story. It\nalso seems like a step one has to go through when interpreting the text.\n\nThe problem, as I see it, is that Wright pretty much stops there. Many people,\nand Wolfe included, I would think, want to say that there's yet a third \"text\"\nwhich is the story of how the Hierodules are still carrying out a divine plan,\neven if they think they're just manipulating everything else. That's the idea\nwe've hashed out so often in this list where \"evil\" turns out to be used for\n\"good,\" etc. Ultimately, I think that Wright's sense of how Wolfe manipulates a\nreader's expectations with stories-within-stories still fits this\ninterpretation.\n\nIn other words, Wright is ultimately giving a methodological reading of Wolfe.\nAnd it's one that I think a majority of readers would agree with. But his\nprimary interpretive example just doesn't go far enough, even on his own terms.\n\nThis is particularly problematic when he gets to Long Sun. It seems to me that\nLong Sun makes it patently clear from the beginning that what we're going to see\nis how true revelation, Silk's vision, has to be understood through a \"fallen\"\nmythology. That seems to be the entire stated point of Long Sun, especially\ngiven the relative directness of the first chapter compared to the opening of\nBotNS. But Wright largely ignores this and, instead, focuses on how Pas has\ncreated a false religion. That entire part of his book just seemed clumsy to me\nas if he was blatantly ignoring aspects of other books that would complicate\nwhat came before.\n\nI'm also a bit mystified about why Wright took the angle he did when Wolfe has\nbeen so straightforward about his own religious beliefs. Wright just never\naddresses it. Granted, not every book that Wolfe writes has to be completely\nconsistent with his own beliefs. One can make stuff up and lie in fiction, after\nall. But, if I recall correctly, Wright never even addresses why Wolfe, a\nbeliever, might have written a book that, according to Wright, is all about how\nbeliefs are ultimately lies.\n\nAnyway...I learned a lot from Wright's book, even if I found it incredibly\nfrustrating at times. Like I said, I think he's good as far as he goes, but he's\nonly finished half of the job. He needs to go further and ask himself how his\nown interpretation could itself still be an \"artifice\" (his term) used to\ndeceive the reader and make him think and read even more closely.\n\n\n\n\n----- Original Message ----\nFrom: Lee Berman\nTo: urth at lists.urth.net\nSent: Mon, November 29, 2010 6:16:44 AM\nSubject: (urth) academic commentary" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Jeff WIlson- He effectively says the \"evil does the work of the Increate, too\"\nmeme\n\nwas planted by the Yesodis?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Yeah, that's my gathering. I think Wright analyzes BotNS from an atheistic\nperspective.\nSo there is no truly higher spiritual power involved. Just some highly advanced\naliens\nwho play Severian and humanity like a fiddle.\n\nJane I think I remember which short paragraph it was in which \"the relationship\n& balance\n\nof power between Tzadkiel and Severian are both subverted - turned upon their\nheads\n\nindeed\". Is it where Tzadkiel confesses to being an acolyte to Severian in a\ndifferent\nuniverse or something like that?\n\nSort of similar to the reversal we see where Barbatus and Famulimus, so tall and\nbeautiful\n\nand from a giant spaceship, take a knee and bow before scruffy Severian.\n\nMy impression is that Wright interprets BotNS from an atheist point of view\nbecause he is,\nhimself a devout atheist and perhaps unwilling to acknowledge spirituality in\nthe work of\nan author he so admires, despite awareness of Wolfe's religious leanings.\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF3D50C.20400@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T16:30:04+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF3D13D.1020405@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "David Stockhoff wrote (29-11-2010 16:13):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Well argued, Craig.\n\nYes, I think Wolfe is deep enough as a Catholic and an author to be able\nto weave into his narratives all sorts of apparently contradictory\nprinciples. I could begin with the reader's---at least the naive\nreader's---necessary movement from \"Narration is truth\" to \"Narration is\nlies\" and ultimately to \"Narration that is lies is also truth, maybe\neven a better truth.\"\n\nReplace \"narration\" with \"belief,\" and consider that Wolfe had a long\npath of conversion to Catholicism, and you have your 3 texts as well as\na motivation for Wolfe to \"create\" such a long and complicated tale.\n\nThanks for the Wright summary. It does seem odd that he did all this\nwork but could not make the final leap." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It'd be an uncomfortable/inconvenient leap for him to make." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF3D5D1.5070803@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T16:33:21+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF3D13D.1020405@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "David Stockhoff wrote (29-11-2010 16:13):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Well argued, Craig.\n\nYes, I think Wolfe is deep enough as a Catholic and an author to be able\nto weave into his narratives all sorts of apparently contradictory\nprinciples. I could begin with the reader's---at least the naive\nreader's---necessary movement from \"Narration is truth\" to \"Narration is\nlies\" and ultimately to \"Narration that is lies is also truth, maybe\neven a better truth.\"\n\nReplace \"narration\" with \"belief,\" and consider that Wolfe had a long\npath of conversion to Catholicism, and you have your 3 texts as well as\na motivation for Wolfe to \"create\" such a long and complicated tale.\n\nThanks for the Wright summary. It does seem odd that he did all this\nwork but could not make the final leap." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It'd be an uncomfortable/inconvenient leap for him to make." } ] }, { "message_id": "<7C7398E0-6124-48FF-8FF1-73DF9A43030F@butcherbaker.org>", "from": { "name": "Son of Witz", "address": "sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org" }, "date": "2010-11-29T18:03:33+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<964735.56099.qm@web37604.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Good post Brewer.\nI stopped reading Attending Daedalus at a point. It felt like he was missing the point to me, by not getting to that \"third text\" you mention.\n\nRegarding whether the Heirogrammates and Heirodules serve God, has been answered here, as in the Cock and Eagle story. They guess at God's will, and even evil serves him.\n\nHowever, the central theme of Resurrection / Death and the cyclical nature of time and creation, gets overlooked when we read this 'second text' interpreting the Heirogrammates as 'just some twisted robots playing eugenics on their creators.' it doesn't matter that they are robots. What matters, in the metaphor, is this cyclical inversion of causality. We create them so they can recreate us so we can create them so they can recreate us so we can create them so they can recreate us so we can create them so they can recreate us so we can create them so they can recreate us so we can create them so they can recreate us. And so on.\n\nForget ye not the Amphisbaena!\n\n~Son of Witz." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Nov 29, 2010, at 7:55 AM, Craig Brewer wrote:\nTo be fair, I don't think Wright's central thesis is that BotNS is atheistic. Or \nrather, that's certainly where he ends up, but I don't think he's primarily \ngiving a theological (or a-theological) reading.\n\nInstead, he's concerned with how Wolfe uses intertextuality (both with other \nactual books and you might say \"internal\" intertextual) to create the experience \nof creating and confounding reader expectations. That's something we all know, \nand what ultimately makes his book not all that controversial, I'd think. We all \nknow that reading Wolfe with an eye to a kind of \"second text\" that lies \nunderneath the apparent story is standard operating procedure for a Wolfe book. \nWright just tries to lay out a sort of general methodology for doing that with \nWolfe.\n\nThat said, his primary example is that BotNS *appears* to be a story of Severian \nliving out a kind of spiritual Christ-figure story. But, as Lee said, Wright \nthen shows how there's the second text of the \"aliens who play Severian and \nhumanity like a fiddle.\" That's the atheistic view. And it's certainly there as \na possibility, one that has been mentioned many times, and, I think, most close \nreaders of BotNS accept this Wolfe presents this as one possible, even if \nincomplete, explanation of the larger story a number of times in the story. It \nalso seems like a step one has to go through when interpreting the text.\n\nThe problem, as I see it, is that Wright pretty much stops there. Many people, \nand Wolfe included, I would think, want to say that there's yet a third \"text\" \nwhich is the story of how the Hierodules are still carrying out a divine plan, \neven if they think they're just manipulating everything else. That's the idea \nwe've hashed out so often in this list where \"evil\" turns out to be used for \n\"good,\" etc. Ultimately, I think that Wright's sense of how Wolfe manipulates a \nreader's expectations with stories-within-stories still fits this \ninterpretation.\n\nIn other words, Wright is ultimately giving a methodological reading of Wolfe. \nAnd it's one that I think a majority of readers would agree with. But his \nprimary interpretive example just doesn't go far enough, even on his own terms.\n\nThis is particularly problematic when he gets to Long Sun. It seems to me that \nLong Sun makes it patently clear from the beginning that what we're going to see \nis how true revelation, Silk's vision, has to be understood through a \"fallen\" \nmythology. That seems to be the entire stated point of Long Sun, especially \ngiven the relative directness of the first chapter compared to the opening of \nBotNS. But Wright largely ignores this and, instead, focuses on how Pas has \ncreated a false religion. That entire part of his book just seemed clumsy to me \nas if he was blatantly ignoring aspects of other books that would complicate \nwhat came before.\n\nI'm also a bit mystified about why Wright took the angle he did when Wolfe has \nbeen so straightforward about his own religious beliefs. Wright just never \naddresses it. Granted, not every book that Wolfe writes has to be completely \nconsistent with his own beliefs. One can make stuff up and lie in fiction, after \nall. But, if I recall correctly, Wright never even addresses why Wolfe, a \nbeliever, might have written a book that, according to Wright, is all about how \nbeliefs are ultimately lies.\n\nAnyway...I learned a lot from Wright's book, even if I found it incredibly \nfrustrating at times. Like I said, I think he's good as far as he goes, but he's \nonly finished half of the job. He needs to go further and ask himself how his \nown interpretation could itself still be an \"artifice\" (his term) used to \ndeceive the reader and make him think and read even more closely.\n\n\n\n\n----- Original Message ----\nFrom: Lee Berman \nTo: urth at lists.urth.net\nSent: Mon, November 29, 2010 6:16:44 AM\nSubject: (urth) academic commentary" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Jeff WIlson- He effectively says the \"evil does the work of the Increate, too\" \nmeme \n\nwas planted by the Yesodis?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Yeah, that's my gathering. I think Wright analyzes BotNS from an atheistic \nperspective.\nSo there is no truly higher spiritual power involved. Just some highly advanced \naliens\nwho play Severian and humanity like a fiddle.\n\nJane I think I remember which short paragraph it was in which \"the relationship \n& balance \n\nof power between Tzadkiel and Severian are both subverted - turned upon their \nheads \n\nindeed\". Is it where Tzadkiel confesses to being an acolyte to Severian in a \ndifferent\nuniverse or something like that?\n\nSort of similar to the reversal we see where Barbatus and Famulimus, so tall and \nbeautiful \n\nand from a giant spaceship, take a knee and bow before scruffy Severian.\n\nMy impression is that Wright interprets BotNS from an atheist point of view \nbecause he is,\nhimself a devout atheist and perhaps unwilling to acknowledge spirituality in \nthe work of\nan author he so admires, despite awareness of Wolfe's religious leanings.\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF3ED73.2020900@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-11-29T18:14:11+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF3D50C.20400@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Why?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/29/2010 11:30 AM, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:\nDavid Stockhoff wrote (29-11-2010 16:13):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Well argued, Craig.\n\nYes, I think Wolfe is deep enough as a Catholic and an author to be able\nto weave into his narratives all sorts of apparently contradictory\nprinciples. I could begin with the reader's---at least the naive\nreader's---necessary movement from \"Narration is truth\" to \"Narration is\nlies\" and ultimately to \"Narration that is lies is also truth, maybe\neven a better truth.\"\n\nReplace \"narration\" with \"belief,\" and consider that Wolfe had a long\npath of conversion to Catholicism, and you have your 3 texts as well as\na motivation for Wolfe to \"create\" such a long and complicated tale.\n\nThanks for the Wright summary. It does seem odd that he did all this\nwork but could not make the final leap." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "It'd be an uncomfortable/inconvenient leap for him to make.\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF3F10B.1020206@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T18:29:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF3ED73.2020900@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "David Stockhoff wrote (29-11-2010 18:14):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Why?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Because it would conflict either with his own beliefs or the rationalisation \nof his appreciation of the work." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/29/2010 11:30 AM, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "David Stockhoff wrote (29-11-2010 16:13):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "Well argued, Craig.\n\nYes, I think Wolfe is deep enough as a Catholic and an author to be able\nto weave into his narratives all sorts of apparently contradictory\nprinciples. I could begin with the reader's---at least the naive\nreader's---necessary movement from \"Narration is truth\" to \"Narration is\nlies\" and ultimately to \"Narration that is lies is also truth, maybe\neven a better truth.\"\n\nReplace \"narration\" with \"belief,\" and consider that Wolfe had a long\npath of conversion to Catholicism, and you have your 3 texts as well as\na motivation for Wolfe to \"create\" such a long and complicated tale.\n\nThanks for the Wright summary. It does seem odd that he did all this\nwork but could not make the final leap." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "It'd be an uncomfortable/inconvenient leap for him to make.\n_______________________________________________\nUrth Mailing List\nTo post, write urth at urth.net\nSubscription/information: http://www.urth.net\n\n\n---\navast! Antivirus: Inbound message clean.\nVirus Database (VPS): 101129-0, 11/29/2010\nTested on: 11/29/2010 11:32:58 AM\navast! - copyright (c) 1988-2010 AVAST Software.\nhttp://www.avast.com" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "---\navast! Antivirus: Outbound message clean.\nVirus Database (VPS): 101129-1, 11/29/2010\nTested on: 11/29/2010 1:14:11 PM\navast! - copyright (c) 1988-2010 AVAST Software.\nhttp://www.avast.com\n\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF3F872.3050800@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-11-29T19:01:06+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF3F10B.1020206@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I suppose that's as good a guess as any, but I'm guessing that you are \nguessing, Antonio. Perhaps you think his atheism got in the way? I don't \nsee why---my atheism doesn't get in my way. But that's still a valid guess.\n\nI'll rephrase my remark: It seems odd that Wright would be a student of \nliterature and a fan of Wolfe and not be able to see what Wolfe does \nwith mythology/fantasy and what he does with narrative itself, and see \nwhere they lead. The patterns are clear: the trees form a forest whose \nshape can be seen.\n\nThere are so many writers of classic science fiction who are Jewish, and \ntheir work could almost be called atheistic. Wolfe obviously is not one \nof them. Reading Wolfe as a whole leaves one little opportunity to miss \nthe forest.\n\nLet me make my own guess: Wright is uncomfortable dealing with authorial \nintent---he was trained to avoid it, as so many grad students were in \nrecent decades---and so he does. Here's another: for some reason, Wright \nis unfamiliar with Wolfe's work outside BOTNS/LS/SS.\n\nTo those of you who have read Wright---any guesses? Are either of these \npossible?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/29/2010 1:29 PM, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:\nDavid Stockhoff wrote (29-11-2010 18:14):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Why?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Because it would conflict either with his own beliefs or the \nrationalisation of his appreciation of the work." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On 11/29/2010 11:30 AM, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "David Stockhoff wrote (29-11-2010 16:13):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 4, "text": "Well argued, Craig.\n\nYes, I think Wolfe is deep enough as a Catholic and an author to be \nable\nto weave into his narratives all sorts of apparently contradictory\nprinciples. I could begin with the reader's---at least the naive\nreader's---necessary movement from \"Narration is truth\" to \n\"Narration is\nlies\" and ultimately to \"Narration that is lies is also truth, maybe\neven a better truth.\"\n\nReplace \"narration\" with \"belief,\" and consider that Wolfe had a long\npath of conversion to Catholicism, and you have your 3 texts as \nwell as\na motivation for Wolfe to \"create\" such a long and complicated tale.\n\nThanks for the Wright summary. It does seem odd that he did all this\nwork but could not make the final leap." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "It'd be an uncomfortable/inconvenient leap for him to make.\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF3FE4A.4070707@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-11-29T19:26:02+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF3F872.3050800@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Or, maybe Wright does not fully understand fantasy as a form of \nliterature and believes it amounts to escapism. It's a common error.\n\nFor Wolfe, fantasy is plainly the opposite of escapism, except that he \nenjoys his material and probably gets to escape into it while he writes." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/29/2010 2:01 PM, David Stockhoff wrote:\nI suppose that's as good a guess as any, but I'm guessing that you are \nguessing, Antonio. Perhaps you think his atheism got in the way? I \ndon't see why---my atheism doesn't get in my way. But that's still a \nvalid guess.\n\nI'll rephrase my remark: It seems odd that Wright would be a student \nof literature and a fan of Wolfe and not be able to see what Wolfe \ndoes with mythology/fantasy and what he does with narrative itself, \nand see where they lead. The patterns are clear: the trees form a \nforest whose shape can be seen.\n\nThere are so many writers of classic science fiction who are Jewish, \nand their work could almost be called atheistic. Wolfe obviously is \nnot one of them. Reading Wolfe as a whole leaves one little \nopportunity to miss the forest.\n\nLet me make my own guess: Wright is uncomfortable dealing with \nauthorial intent---he was trained to avoid it, as so many grad \nstudents were in recent decades---and so he does. Here's another: for \nsome reason, Wright is unfamiliar with Wolfe's work outside BOTNS/LS/SS.\n\nTo those of you who have read Wright---any guesses? Are either of \nthese possible?" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T19:49:12+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF3FE4A.4070707@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Agreed, great post Craig!\n \nRegarding Wright's failure to fully realize the deceptions within deceptions:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "David Stockhoff: Why?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Antonio P. Marques: Because it would conflict either with his own beliefs or the rationalisation \nof his appreciation of the work." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nHeh. I am reminded of my days in scientific academia and the debates between Evolutionary scientists\nand Creation scientists. I remember the snickers from the Evolutionists at the argument that the \nhuman eye disproves Evolution because of its perfect, coordinated design and the worthlessness of each of \nits individual parts. [It is a perfectly bad argument given a major neural design flaw in the eye, causing \nour blind spot and the usefulness of eyespots, essentially a naked retina, found in many creatures.]\n \nPerhaps here we have the reverse- an atheist struggling to find solid ground for an atheist argument\nwithin a book with religious elements created by a religious author.\n\nBelow are some exerpts from a Peter Wright interview of Wolfe. Wright clearly respects and admires Wolfe\nbut is determined to make his own points. Wolfe can't seem to help but toy with him a bit:\n \n.........................................................................................................." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "PW: One other recurring theme that's interested me in your fiction is the manipulation of individuals by \ngodlike beings or powers. Where does that notion derive from?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: I suppose it comes from the idea that we are in fact manipulated- and we all are. Some of us are willing\nto acknowledge God as the godlike power in our lives. Even those who are not- and probably even more those \nwho are not willing to acknowledge that sort of thing- are manipulated not only by God but by a whole host of \nsubsidiary powers, political, economic and so on. We tend to think we have free will and so on. In the mass \nwe're very predictable. There's very little difference between traffic flowing on a highway and liquid \nflowing through a pipe. They act in about the same way." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "PW: You see predictability as the basis for exploitation." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: Certainly it is part of the basis, yes." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "PW: Where does that interest in manipulation come from?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: Because I have to live in this world, as we all do." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "................................................................................................................" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "PW: The angels- if we want to call them that- in Urth of the New Sun, the Hierogrammates, are of\nthat nature. They are not simply good angels, despite appearances." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: They are certainly not simple, good angels. If you are not wholly and totally good and pure\nyourself, and you are not, an angel may be a very dangerous person for you to deal with, because he is." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "................................................................................................................" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: I want to write \"The Three Little Pigs\" from the standpoint of the wolf. The original author sympathised \nentirely with the pigs. The wolf sympathizes with the other wolves and their children and he says, \"Somebody \nis going to eath these pigs- might as well be me'" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "PW: Again you've got an evil character justifying his actions" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: He's not an evil character. Is he?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "PW: No." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: Or is he?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "PW: Well...." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: Yeah." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "PW: Well he's just following his instincts. But the thing about fairy tales is that many of the animals found in \nthem are anthropomorphized and they become classified as good and evil." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "GW: Exactly. And it's rather unfair to the ones we generally characterize as evil." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "..................................................................................................................\n \nHeh! An atheist, socialist and likely feminist maneuvered into acknowledging Wolf's Rights! \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Thomas Bitterman", "address": "tom at bitterman.net" }, "date": "2010-11-29T20:50:22+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF3ED73.2020900@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 1:14 PM, David Stockhoff wrote:\nWhy?\n\n\nOn 11/29/2010 11:30 AM, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "It'd be an uncomfortable/inconvenient leap for him to make." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Perhaps the uncomfortable part is the ad hominem nature of this argument." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF4297A.9090302@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-11-29T22:30:18+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm confused. Whose argument?\n\nI don't think Antonio meant to say anything negative about Wright as a \nperson, if in fact he meant Wright's atheism blinded him to certain \ninterpretations. It's certainly possible---happens all the time, I'm sure." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/29/2010 3:50 PM, Thomas Bitterman wrote:\nOn Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 1:14 PM, David Stockhoff \n> wrote:\n\n Why?\n\n\n On 11/29/2010 11:30 AM, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:\n\n\n It'd be an uncomfortable/inconvenient leap for him to make.\n\n\nPerhaps the uncomfortable part is the ad hominem nature of this argument.\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF437C9.6000707@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-29T23:31:21+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF4297A.9090302@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "David Stockhoff wrote:\nI'm confused. Whose argument?\n\nI don't think Antonio meant to say anything negative about Wright as a\nperson, if in fact he meant Wright's atheism blinded him to certain\ninterpretations. It's certainly possible---happens all the time, I'm sure." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Just to clarify things a bit, I only said it would be an uncomfortable or \ninconvenient leap. I can't understand how that got construed as an attack, \npersonal or not.\n\nI don't think the evidence points to Wright being *intellectually unable* to \nmake such a leap, so the guess (yeah) is that he did shy from it, either \nconscious or unconsciously. I also don't think atheism itself is the issue, \nunless he were bent on seeing Wolfe as an atheist, which again I don't see \nthat he does. So I guess (squared) that said 'third' reading is either \nsomething Wright doesn't find interesting or that he fears may open a few \ncans of interpretative worms somewhere if given enough importance.\n\n(I think at this time and place everyone can read Wolfe both with and \nwithout Wolfe and/or Wolfe's motivations.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/29/2010 3:50 PM, Thomas Bitterman wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On Mon, Nov 29, 2010 at 1:14 PM, David Stockhoff\n> wrote:\n\nWhy?\n\n\nOn 11/29/2010 11:30 AM, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:\n\n\nIt'd be an uncomfortable/inconvenient leap for him to make.\n\n\nPerhaps the uncomfortable part is the ad hominem nature of this argument.\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF45CE9.3090104@sky.com>", "from": { "name": "Jane Delawney", "address": "jane_delawney at sky.com" }, "date": "2010-11-30T02:09:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) thanks (was: Re: academic commentary)", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 29/11/10 12:16, Lee Berman wrote:\nJane I think I remember which short paragraph it was in which \"the relationship& balance\nof power between Tzadkiel and Severian are both subverted - turned upon their heads\nindeed\". Is it where Tzadkiel confesses to being an acolyte to Severian in a different\nuniverse or something like that?\n " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "thanks for your response Lee and also to others, I'm just catching up. \nYes, that is exactly the reference I was thinking of. IMO Wright either \nmisses it, or chooses to disregard it." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Sort of similar to the reversal we see where Barbatus and Famulimus, so tall and beautiful\nand from a giant spaceship, take a knee and bow before scruffy Severian.\n " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And he's baffled and embarrassed because he's no idea they live in \nreverse and know he's The One. Yes, that too - no mention in Wright. \nHe'd have found both these little episodes difficult to explain in terms \nof his hypothesis of devious manipulative Yesodis who steer naive and \nnone too bright mnemonist Sev into believing they are the spokesmen of \nthe Increate. Actually as we see from both of these episodes, the one I \nreferred to and the one you provide also, the situation is almost \nexactly the other way round. Tzadkiel and the Hierodules revere (is \n'worship' too strong a word? not sure) Severian. They have a sense of \ntime which is either 'outside' or own, or runs in the opposite \ndirection. They know who and what he is, even if he himself does not." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "My impression is that Wright interprets BotNS from an atheist point of view because he is,\nhimself a devout atheist and perhaps unwilling to acknowledge spirituality in the work of\nan author he so admires, despite awareness of Wolfe's religious leanings.\n " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wright also says at one point that whilst he realises Wolfe is a \nCatholic he (ie. Wolfe) is more than capable of writing from a \nmaterialistic point of view (this is not an exact quote but the sense of \nwhat is said). However he doesn't provide any concrete evidence for this \nwhich I found disappointing.\n\nlooking forward to reading further responses but not sure I'll be \nwriting much more tonight - getting very late.\n\ncheers\n\njd" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Thomas Bitterman", "address": "tom at bitterman.net" }, "date": "2010-11-30T02:22:15+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF437C9.6000707@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "2010/11/29 Ant?nio Pedro Marques " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "David Stockhoff wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I'm confused. Whose argument?\n\nI don't think Antonio meant to say anything negative about Wright as a\nperson, if in fact he meant Wright's atheism blinded him to certain\ninterpretations. It's certainly possible---happens all the time, I'm sure." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Just to clarify things a bit, I only said it would be an uncomfortable or\ninconvenient leap. I can't understand how that got construed as an attack,\npersonal or not." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "My apologies if I have imputed uncharitable motives where none existed.\nAllow me to explain my reasoning. On the non-fiction side of things (which\nis where I think Wright's thesis is meant to be) a researcher who is\nunwilling to follow the evidence wherever it leads is considered a poor\nresearcher. It is akin to intellectual dishonesty.\n\nAnother way of looking at it. The question is \"How did Wright miss/not\ninclude an obvious (and likely superior) interpretation that any careful\nreader would read?\". The answer is \"Because it made him feel\nuncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of arguing against the author\nrather than the thesis.\n\nPerhaps literary criticism works differently.\n\n(I think at this time and place everyone can read Wolfe both with and" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "without Wolfe and/or Wolfe's motivations.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I agree. Fiction works differently." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Perfection is what happens when you're not looking closely enough: it's a\nperceptual mistake on the operator's end of the equation.\n - Dr. Quandry" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "David Duffy", "address": "davidd at qimr.edu.au" }, "date": "2010-11-30T03:05:34+00:00", "subject": "(urth) thanks (was: Re: academic commentary)", "in_reply_to": "<4CF45CE9.3090104@sky.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, 30 Nov 2010, Jane Delawney wrote:\nthanks for your response Lee and also to others, I'm just catching up. Yes, \nthat is exactly the reference I was thinking of. IMO Wright either misses it, \nor chooses to disregard it." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Sort of similar to the reversal we see where Barbatus and Famulimus, so \ntall and beautiful\nand from a giant spaceship, take a knee and bow before scruffy Severian." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "And he's baffled and embarrassed because he's no idea they live in reverse \nand know he's The One. Yes, that too - no mention in Wright. He'd have found \nboth these little episodes difficult to explain in terms of his hypothesis of \ndevious manipulative Yesodis who steer naive and none too bright..." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Surely that's exactly what devious manipulators would do ;)\n\nDavid Duffy." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF46E6F.3000302@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-11-30T03:24:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Certainly literary criticism allows way too much leeway to critics \ntrying to make texts into something they are not, whether to establish \nthemselves or just make a splash. But I see your point.\n\nI think I was thinking along similar lines when I suggested that Wright \nmerely had ideological/pedagogical blinkers on. I doubt Wright was \nreally being dishonest, but I think it's OK to get that possibility out \nthere and dispense with it, if possible." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 11/29/2010 9:22 PM, Thomas Bitterman wrote:\n2010/11/29 Ant?nio Pedro Marques >\n\n David Stockhoff wrote:\n\n I'm confused. Whose argument?\n\n I don't think Antonio meant to say anything negative about\n Wright as a\n person, if in fact he meant Wright's atheism blinded him to\n certain\n interpretations. It's certainly possible---happens all the\n time, I'm sure.\n\n\n Just to clarify things a bit, I only said it would be an\n uncomfortable or inconvenient leap. I can't understand how that\n got construed as an attack, personal or not.\n\n\nMy apologies if I have imputed uncharitable motives where none \nexisted. Allow me to explain my reasoning. On the non-fiction side \nof things (which is where I think Wright's thesis is meant to be) a \nresearcher who is unwilling to follow the evidence wherever it leads \nis considered a poor researcher. It is akin to intellectual dishonesty.\n\nAnother way of looking at it. The question is \"How did Wright \nmiss/not include an obvious (and likely superior) interpretation that \nany careful reader would read?\". The answer is \"Because it made him \nfeel uncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of arguing against \nthe author rather than the thesis.\n\nPerhaps literary criticism works differently.\n\n (I think at this time and place everyone can read Wolfe both with\n and without Wolfe and/or Wolfe's motivations.)\n\n\nI agree. Fiction works differently.\n-- \nPerfection is what happens when you're not looking closely enough: \nit's a perceptual mistake on the operator's end of the equation.\n - Dr. Quandry\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF4F047.7090504@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-30T12:38:31+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 02:22):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Another way of looking at it. The question is \"How did Wright miss/not\ninclude an obvious (and likely superior) interpretation that any careful\n reader would read?\". The answer is \"Because it made him feel\nuncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of arguing against the\nauthor rather than the thesis." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "But is it more complimenting to answer \"Because it's above his league?\"? I\ncertainly don't think that's the case." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Allow me to explain my reasoning. On the non-fiction side of things\n(which is where I think Wright's thesis is meant to be) a researcher who\nis unwilling to follow the evidence wherever it leads is considered a\npoor researcher. It is akin to intellectual dishonesty." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Not necessarily. Where the evidence leads is always subject to\ninterpretation. If anything, it would be dishonest to tamper with the\nevidence in order that the public wouldn't follow it into disliked\nterritory. But Wright doesn't do that at all. So my view is that he doesn't\nfind the obvious, likely superior interpretation that obvious and likely\nsuperior. And not to mention it at all suggests he finds it unhelpful. He \ndoesn't close the path either, he just leaves it for the public to follow on \ntheir own." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-30T13:57:24+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF4F047.7090504@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Antonio P. Marques: it would be dishonest to tamper with the evidence in order \nthat the public wouldn't follow it into disliked territory. But Wright doesn't \ndo that at all. So my view is that he doesn't find the obvious, likely superior \ninterpretation that obvious and likely superior. And not to mention it at all \nsuggests he finds it unhelpful. He doesn't close the path either, he just leaves \nit for the public to follow on their own." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nI would agree. Perhaps Wolfe's mild taunting of Wright in the interview I previously\nquoted could be more construed as an ad hominem attack since they were in conversation.\nBut since we here are dealing with Wright only in literary form I think knowledge of \nhis atheistic or socialist tendencies is fair game for understanding his work as much as\nknowledge of Wolfe's religious/political leanings.\n \nIn some ways it is a sign of respect of an artist to show interest enough to explore their\npersonal aspects in a quest for deeper understanding of their art. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<363353.81138.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-11-30T16:48:05+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Just on Wright's \"unwillingness\" to discuss a theological standpoint: after \nreading the book, I think he just honestly believes that BotNS is a book about \ndeception, primarily about how religious notions can be manipulative. I don't \nthink he's particularly unwilling to see a deeper dimension. I think he just \nstraightforwardly disagrees that the book, as written, contains that deeper \nmessage.\n\nHe can certainly be wrong. But I doubt that he's deliberately ignoring things in \nNew Sun that suggest something deeper. I just think he would disagree that they \nare actually signs of \"real\" divinity.\n\nAnd, to be honest, I think that's a valid reading of New Sun. It seems possible \nto me to make a hard and fast textual \"proof\" that the Hierodules are \nmanipulating Severian's experiences throughout most of the text. I'm NOT sure \nthat you can make a hard and fast textual \"proof\" that the Increate is also \nbehind what the Hierodules are doing. (I would gladly be proven wrong on that \npoint, however.)\n\nNow, I actually think the latter is the case, but it's a looser interpretation \nthat's probably heavily influenced by what I assume to be Wolfe's intentions. \nGoing strictly by what the text says, it does seem to me possible (although \ndisappointing) that Wright's thesis is correct. Perhaps that's because the \ntheological dimension requires a different attitude toward interpretation than \nsimply finding passages that essentially say \"and here the Increate was guiding \nthe Hierodules' hands.\" Perhaps it requires a broader sense of interpretation \nthat involves a lot more speculation and a willingness to allow hints and \nsuggestions to stand as \"evidence\" of a reading. But given the limits that \nWright sets himself for interpretation, I think he's on solid ground.\n\nLike I said before, things change when we get to Long Sun. There, the *real* \nsupernatural seems much more apparent than in NS. But with Severian, there's the \nsuggestion that everything supernatural could actually have another explanation. \n(Granted, Urth of the New Sun complicates this with its different style of \nnarration.) In Long Sun and Short Sun, though, we seem to be playing by somewhat \ndifferent rules, at least in terms of how the narrative decides to show us \nwhat's happening. In New Sun, however, Severian's filter and the growing \nawareness of what the Hierodules are up to makes it much more difficult to \ndetermine what is ultimately \"alien manipulation\" and what is ultimately \n\"divine.\"\n\nSo in the end, I think that Wright's interpretation is valid. I don't personally \nagree with it, but I'm not entirely confident that I could make my case on his \nterms. If the standard you set for yourself when reading is that everything the \nauthor says is suspect and most likely a potential deception (this is largely \nWright's methodology), then making a positive case for real divinity in New Sun \nbecomes incredibly difficult. I just wonder if that's the best way to approach \nWolfe since, along with the puzzles and the hints and the misleading \ncharacterizations, there's also a lot of sincerity and straightforward \nintegrity. Determining when you have which attitude, though, is often more a \nmatter of judgment and even faith (in the author? in something else?) rather \nthan solid textual \"proof.\"\n\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF53015.5060201@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-30T17:10:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<363353.81138.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Another great post, Craig, but,\n\nCraig Brewer wrote (30-11-2010 16:48):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "If the standard you set for yourself when reading is that everything the\nauthor says is suspect and most likely a potential deception (this is largely\nWright's methodology), then making a positive case for real divinity in New Sun\nbecomes incredibly difficult." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "...it seems to me that making a positive case for anything at all is very \ndifficult (whether by positive you mean definite or positivist)." } ] }, { "message_id": "<551229.13019.qm@web84106.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-11-30T17:11:17+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<363353.81138.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I agree that text #3 is more grounded in intuition than texts #1 and #2. It is certainly fair for a critic to leave it open, even if I personally see it (more or less as I have said) as counting all the trees and never acknowledging the forest. If a critic sees his task as one of cataloguing, then that's enough. Better than pages of windy speculation.\nI also concur that BOTNS is full of plain statements of fact, both from Severian and from his characters. The trick is not just to reveal the deception but also to distinguish the bald truth from the bald lies. We can ask, IF X is lying, what is the deception, and why? If the question cannot be plausibly answered, maybe the statement is simply true, or at least sincere. (I recall Thecla voicing very sensible concerns about the Increate; these do not suggest to me that Wolfe or even Thecla is an atheist---merely rational.)\nAnother possible angle is one I would not expect Wright to use, and that is to ask, IF the Increate/divine is \"present\" in BOTNS, where is he/it? Perhaps this is backwards, but again: once we have counted and catalogued the trees, isn't it time to talk about forests?\nI should shut up now and go read the book. It sounds promising on a basic interpretive level.\n\n--- On Tue, 11/30/10, Craig Brewer wrote:\n\nFrom: Craig Brewer \nSubject: Re: (urth) academic commentary\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Tuesday, November 30, 2010, 11:48 AM\n\nJust on Wright's \"unwillingness\" to discuss a theological standpoint: after \nreading the book, I think he just honestly believes that BotNS is a book about \ndeception, primarily about how religious notions can be manipulative. I don't \nthink he's particularly unwilling to see a deeper dimension. I think he just \nstraightforwardly disagrees that the book, as written, contains that deeper \nmessage.\n\nHe can certainly be wrong. But I doubt that he's deliberately ignoring things in \nNew Sun that suggest something deeper. I just think he would disagree that they \nare actually signs of \"real\" divinity.\n\nAnd, to be honest, I think that's a valid reading of New Sun. It seems possible \nto me to make a hard and fast textual \"proof\" that the Hierodules are \nmanipulating Severian's experiences throughout most of the text. I'm NOT sure \nthat you can make a hard and fast textual \"proof\" that the Increate is also \nbehind what the Hierodules are doing. (I would gladly be proven wrong on that \npoint, however.)\n\nNow, I actually think the latter is the case, but it's a looser interpretation \nthat's probably heavily influenced by what I assume to be Wolfe's intentions. \nGoing strictly by what the text says, it does seem to me possible (although \ndisappointing) that Wright's thesis is correct. Perhaps that's because the \ntheological dimension requires a different attitude toward interpretation than \nsimply finding passages that essentially say \"and here the Increate was guiding \nthe Hierodules' hands.\" Perhaps it requires a broader sense of interpretation \nthat involves a lot more speculation and a willingness to allow hints and \nsuggestions to stand as \"evidence\" of a reading. But given the limits that \nWright sets himself for interpretation, I think he's on solid ground.\n\nLike I said before, things change when we get to Long Sun. There, the *real* \nsupernatural seems much more apparent than in NS. But with Severian, there's the \nsuggestion that everything supernatural could actually have another explanation. \n(Granted, Urth of the New Sun complicates this with its different style of \nnarration.) In Long Sun and Short Sun, though, we seem to be playing by somewhat \ndifferent rules, at least in terms of how the narrative decides to show us \nwhat's happening. In New Sun, however, Severian's filter and the growing \nawareness of what the Hierodules are up to makes it much more difficult to \ndetermine what is ultimately \"alien manipulation\" and what is ultimately \n\"divine.\"\n\nSo in the end, I think that Wright's interpretation is valid. I don't personally \nagree with it, but I'm not entirely confident that I could make my case on his \nterms. If the standard you set for yourself when reading is that everything the \nauthor says is suspect and most likely a potential deception (this is largely \nWright's methodology), then making a positive case for real divinity in New Sun \nbecomes incredibly difficult. I just wonder if that's the best way to approach \nWolfe since, along with the puzzles and the hints and the misleading \ncharacterizations, there's also a lot of sincerity and straightforward \nintegrity. Determining when you have which attitude, though, is often more a \nmatter of judgment and even faith (in the author? in something else?) rather \nthan solid textual \"proof.\"\n\n\n\n? ? ? " } ] }, { "message_id": "<268638.63617.qm@web37607.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-11-30T17:16:09+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF53015.5060201@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "A very fair point. I think that's especially true of New Sun...and probably of \nWolfe in general...especially since so many people see so many different \"clues\" \nas \"evidence\" of all kinds of deeper explanations. Robert Borski is a perfect \nexample. I find his interpretations fascinating but also baffling at what seems \nto convince him of some of his readings.\n\n\n\n\n----- Original Message ----\nFrom: Ant?nio Pedro Marques \nTo: The Urth Mailing List \nSent: Tue, November 30, 2010 11:10:45 AM\nSubject: Re: (urth) academic commentary\n\nAnother great post, Craig, but,\n\nCraig Brewer wrote (30-11-2010 16:48):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "If the standard you set for yourself when reading is that everything the\nauthor says is suspect and most likely a potential deception (this is largely\nWright's methodology), then making a positive case for real divinity in New \nSun\nbecomes incredibly difficult." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "...it seems to me that making a positive case for anything at all is very \ndifficult (whether by positive you mean definite or positivist)." } ] }, { "message_id": "<716821.87492.qm@web37606.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-11-30T17:50:56+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<551229.13019.qm@web84106.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think this is how many more people approach the text (at least on this list):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "David said:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "Another possible angle is one I would not expect Wright to use, and that is to \nask, IF the Increate/divine is \"present\" in BOTNS, where is he/it? Perhaps this \nis backwards,\nbut again: once we have counted and catalogued the trees, isn't it time to talk \nabout forests?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The bigger point of Wright's book is to say that Wolfe is usually doing \nsomething opposite and even intentionally disruptive of that. One way to put it \nis that Wright thinks that Wolfe is almost always pretending to write \"fantasy\" \n(whether that \"fantasy\" be magic, the supernatural, or even religious notions) \nwhen, in fact, he's writing science fiction. He seems to think that there is \nalways a mundane, \"rational,\" materialistic explanation for the otherworldly. \n(Wright would LOVE LOVE LOVE the notion floated awhile back about _The \nSorcerer's House_ which suggested that the whole thing was a complicated scam \nrather than an actual story of magic.) Or if that's too extreme (I mean, even \nWright admits that Latro does actually talk to gods in his stories), then it's \nrather than Wolfe's narrators or narrative voice is always being deceptive about \n*something* (perhaps even self-deceptive), and the reader's job is disabuse them \nof those deceptions. It just so happens that Wright's examples of \"deception\" \nare usually when Wolfe does \"fantasy/magic/religion.\"\n\nAnyway, I do recommend it, even if I don't agree with it. Wright knows when he's \nsaying things that a lot of Wolfe fans will disagree with, and he makes his case \nknowing that it might be a minority opinion. And I found his arguments to be \nthoughtful rather than arbitrary, which is what you want when you're looking for \na good discussion.\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Thomas Bitterman", "address": "tom at bitterman.net" }, "date": "2010-11-30T18:55:09+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF4F047.7090504@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 02:22):\n\n\n Another way of looking at it. The question is \"How did Wright miss/not\ninclude an obvious (and likely superior) interpretation that any careful\n reader would read?\". The answer is \"Because it made him feel\nuncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of arguing against the\nauthor rather than the thesis." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But is it more complimenting to answer \"Because it's above his league?\"? I\ncertainly don't think that's the case." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That is a false dichotomy. There are other ways to answer which do not\ninvolve speculation on Wright's personal properties. I would even suggest\nthat the question itself is not helpful/applicable to understanding a\nnon-fiction thesis.\n\nCraig Brewer has a good post on another thread with the same name describing\nhow he sees Wright's method. I agree with him." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF54F7D.7050205@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-11-30T19:24:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 18:55):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques >\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 02:22):\n\n Another way of looking at it. The question is \"How did Wright\n miss/not\n include an obvious (and likely superior) interpretation that any\n careful\n reader would read?\". The answer is \"Because it made him feel\n uncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of arguing against the\n author rather than the thesis.\n\n But is it more complimenting to answer \"Because it's above his\n league?\"? I\n certainly don't think that's the case.\n\nThat is a false dichotomy. There are other ways to answer which do not\ninvolve speculation on Wright's personal properties. I would even\nsuggest that the question itself is not helpful/applicable to\nunderstanding a non-fiction thesis." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "At the end of the day the fact remains that Wright left a certain path \nunexplored and that demands an explanation. And that is lacking. It should \nhave been made explicit from the onset.\n\nOf course if one views speculation over a person's choices as speculation \nover the person, then any answer will look like just that." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Craig Brewer has a good post on another thread with the same name\ndescribing how he sees Wright's method. I agree with him." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Craig's view(s) fall within what I consider(ed) 'inconvenien[ce]' - the \n'third' interpretation is not interesting (in an epistemological sense) from \nthe point of view of Wright's method. Craig may have nailed it, but that \ndoesn't mean questions aren't justified.\n\nIn short, I disagree that I am/was making an ad hominem argument. How could \nI? The only thing I know of Wright are bits of his books and interviews. \nThere's nothing I can say about the man except from what I can say about his \nwork." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Thomas Bitterman", "address": "tom at bitterman.net" }, "date": "2010-12-01T02:30:41+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF54F7D.7050205@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 18:55):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques >\n\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 02:22):\n\n Another way of looking at it. The question is \"How did Wright\n miss/not\n include an obvious (and likely superior) interpretation that any\n careful\n reader would read?\". The answer is \"Because it made him feel\n uncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of arguing against\nthe\n author rather than the thesis.\n\n But is it more complimenting to answer \"Because it's above his\n league?\"? I\n certainly don't think that's the case.\n\nThat is a false dichotomy. There are other ways to answer which do not\ninvolve speculation on Wright's personal properties. I would even\nsuggest that the question itself is not helpful/applicable to\nunderstanding a non-fiction thesis." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At the end of the day the fact remains that Wright left a certain path\nunexplored and that demands an explanation. And that is lacking. It should\nhave been made explicit from the onset." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wright's thesis stands or falls on its internal logic and ability to shed\nlight on the material. It is not dependent on what he didn't do except in\nso far as a different theory might be better, and that is a separate\nargument. It certainly doesn't depend upon any imagined reasons for why he\ndid/didn't come to different conclusions.\n\nOf course if one views speculation over a person's choices as speculation" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "over the person, then any answer will look like just that." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "When the speculation takes the form of \"Person X made bad choice Y because\nthey have property Z\" then sure, it looks like that.\n\n Craig Brewer has a good post on another thread with the same name" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "describing how he sees Wright's method. I agree with him." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Craig's view(s) fall within what I consider(ed) 'inconvenien[ce]' - the\n'third' interpretation is not interesting (in an epistemological sense) from\nthe point of view of Wright's method. Craig may have nailed it, but that\ndoesn't mean questions aren't justified." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "If Wright came on the list and said \"Yup, I didn't pursue the 3rd level of\ninterpretation because it made me uncomfortable as an atheist\", would that\nbe enough? If not, what would be? If so, how does that affect the truth of\nhis thesis? Trying to figure out why he did or didn't make a particular\nargument based on a personal property is idle speculation." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T17:03:03+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 6:30 PM, Thomas Bitterman wrote:\nWright's thesis stands or falls on its internal logic and ability to shed\nlight on the material. It is not dependent on what he didn't do except in\nso far as a different theory might be better, and that is a separate\nargument. It certainly doesn't depend upon any imagined reasons for why he\ndid/didn't come to different conclusions." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't have a dog in this race, I haven't read Wright, but speaking\nin terms of general theory -- if there are important facts (internal\nto the text or _maybe_ about the author) that a theory does not take\ninto account, then that theory is deeply flawed. IMO." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "<516772.59521.qm@web37603.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T17:25:43+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I generally agree. Or rather, I absolutely agree about things internal to the \ntext.\n\nWhen it comes to the author's stated intentions or explanations of a text, \nthough, I'm more conflicted. That's particularly true with Wolfe. Personally, I \nhave to say that any text that can only be understood in relation to something \noutside of it (an interview, a conversation with the author, etc.) is a flawed \ntext. With Wolfe, if there are some \"puzzles\" that can only be answered when \nWolfe tells us the answer, it's his fault for creating a puzzle that's too \nobscure.\n\nBut the opposite extreme can also be a difficulty when people impose \nbiographical information on a text. So, Wolfe is Catholic. Must every single one \nof his stories, novels, and poems then be completely consistent with Catholic \ntheology? That assumption sometimes operates in our theories on this list, and \nit's not necessarily warranted. (I'm guilty of it, too.) I think this is a \nspecial problem when dealing with speculative fiction since it's not just the \nphysical world that a genre writer can play with, but the \nphilosophical/theological/ideological world as well.\n\nWolfe makes the problem of the intentional fallacy particularly...problematic. \nHe demands more of his readers than many writers, but he also writes in such a \nway that implies intense authorial control of even the tiniest details. Reading \nWolfe is often a difficult exercise in navigating between puzzle-solving and \ninterpretation. With puzzles, the author is always right. With interpretation, \nthat's less always the case. But with many of Wolfe's stories, it's difficult to \ntell when we just haven't understood the clues and when we're dealing with an \nambiguity that requires an act of interpretation on the reader's part. When it \ncomes to the scope of an author's authority, they have every right to speak \ndefinitively about how to solve one of their puzzles in an interview, say. But \ntheir interpretation of their work is ultimately one among a larger \nconversation. An author has every right to tell us we're wrong about what \nhappens; he has less right to tell us we're wrong about what it means.\n\nThe difficulty with Wolfe is that it's often hard to tell where the one stops \nand the other begins.\n\n(To make this relate to Wright, I think he's has every right to read New Sun \n*against* the religious meaning many of us might assume Wolfe intended. If \nthat's the reading the text ultimately supports - and, granted, that's the point \nof the debate with him - then that's what it supports. It doesn't matter at all \nwhat Wolfe thought he was writing or what we'd like it to mean if the text \nultimately goes in a Wright's direction. Lot of *IF*s there, of course, but I \nthink it's just really bad logic to say that Wright has to be wrong, a priori, \nbecause Wolfe is Catholic or because he's said in interviews that the book has a \n\"true\" religious meaning, or what have you. It always has to go back to the best \nreading of the books as we have them.)\n\n\n\n----- Original Message ----\nFrom: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes \nTo: The Urth Mailing List \nSent: Wed, December 1, 2010 11:03:03 AM\nSubject: Re: (urth) academic commentary" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 6:30 PM, Thomas Bitterman wrote:\nWright's thesis stands or falls on its internal logic and ability to shed\nlight on the material. It is not dependent on what he didn't do except in\nso far as a different theory might be better, and that is a separate\nargument. It certainly doesn't depend upon any imagined reasons for why he\ndid/didn't come to different conclusions." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't have a dog in this race, I haven't read Wright, but speaking\nin terms of general theory -- if there are important facts (internal\nto the text or _maybe_ about the author) that a theory does not take\ninto account, then that theory is deeply flawed. IMO." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Son of Witz", "address": "sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org" }, "date": "2010-12-01T18:07:47+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<516772.59521.qm@web37603.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I agree with your notion that a \"text that can only be understood in relation to something outside of it is a flawed text.\" however, I don't think that's really the case here.\n\nThe ambiguity in the given cosmology supports Wright's reading as well as my (and most readers, I think) spiritual take, though not equally.\n\nI think the person, (Antonio?) who implied that Wright mat be unable to overcome his atheism to see the spiritual qualities is onto something. Perhaps Wright was THRILLED at the idea of exposing what he sees to be a great literary joke/hoax due to the very fact that it is obstensibly religious. This is a standard thrill amongst those who don't believe the bible literaly. We love to poke holes and point out where any transcendental interpretation might be answered by more mundane concerns such as sun cycles or translation errors. (such as the Camel through the eye of the needle, which should actually read \"rope\" instead of camel) None of this though, for my part at least, is to belittle Wright. I just think he stops short due to philosophical blinders. \n\nBut back to the text and whether it needs you to know GW's faith. I say NO.\nThis book is riddled with so much beautiful heartfelt hope for the future faith that spirit transcends death — and thoroughly understanding of intensly difficult- to- swallow metaphysical ideas. To write all of this stuff off as fraudulent, or simply misguided hope that Severian holds is to miss what this book has to offer. If anything, knowledge of Wolfes catholocism makes this more difficult, as there seems to be a LOT of non catholic material here. \n\n\n~witz" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Dec 1, 2010, at 9:25 AM, Craig Brewer wrote:\nI generally agree. Or rather, I absolutely agree about things internal to the \ntext.\n\nWhen it comes to the author's stated intentions or explanations of a text, \nthough, I'm more conflicted. That's particularly true with Wolfe. Personally, I \nhave to say that any text that can only be understood in relation to something \noutside of it (an interview, a conversation with the author, etc.) is a flawed \ntext. With Wolfe, if there are some \"puzzles\" that can only be answered when \nWolfe tells us the answer, it's his fault for creating a puzzle that's too \nobscure.\n\nBut the opposite extreme can also be a difficulty when people impose \nbiographical information on a text. So, Wolfe is Catholic. Must every single one \nof his stories, novels, and poems then be completely consistent with Catholic \ntheology? That assumption sometimes operates in our theories on this list, and \nit's not necessarily warranted. (I'm guilty of it, too.) I think this is a \nspecial problem when dealing with speculative fiction since it's not just the \nphysical world that a genre writer can play with, but the \nphilosophical/theological/ideological world as well.\n\nWolfe makes the problem of the intentional fallacy particularly...problematic. \nHe demands more of his readers than many writers, but he also writes in such a \nway that implies intense authorial control of even the tiniest details. Reading \nWolfe is often a difficult exercise in navigating between puzzle-solving and \ninterpretation. With puzzles, the author is always right. With interpretation, \nthat's less always the case. But with many of Wolfe's stories, it's difficult to \ntell when we just haven't understood the clues and when we're dealing with an \nambiguity that requires an act of interpretation on the reader's part. When it \ncomes to the scope of an author's authority, they have every right to speak \ndefinitively about how to solve one of their puzzles in an interview, say. But \ntheir interpretation of their work is ultimately one among a larger \nconversation. An author has every right to tell us we're wrong about what \nhappens; he has less right to tell us we're wrong about what it means.\n\nThe difficulty with Wolfe is that it's often hard to tell where the one stops \nand the other begins.\n\n(To make this relate to Wright, I think he's has every right to read New Sun \n*against* the religious meaning many of us might assume Wolfe intended. If \nthat's the reading the text ultimately supports - and, granted, that's the point \nof the debate with him - then that's what it supports. It doesn't matter at all \nwhat Wolfe thought he was writing or what we'd like it to mean if the text \nultimately goes in a Wright's direction. Lot of *IF*s there, of course, but I \nthink it's just really bad logic to say that Wright has to be wrong, a priori, \nbecause Wolfe is Catholic or because he's said in interviews that the book has a \n\"true\" religious meaning, or what have you. It always has to go back to the best \nreading of the books as we have them.)\n\n\n\n----- Original Message ----\nFrom: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF69C94.8020602@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T19:05:56+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Thomas Bitterman wrote (01-12-2010 02:30):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques >\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 18:55):\n\n 2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques \n >>\n\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 02:22):\n\n Another way of looking at it. The question is \"How did\n Wright\n miss/not\n include an obvious (and likely superior) interpretation\n that any\n careful\n reader would read?\". The answer is \"Because it made\n him feel\n uncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of arguing\n against the\n author rather than the thesis.\n\n But is it more complimenting to answer \"Because it's above his\n league?\"? I\n certainly don't think that's the case.\n\n That is a false dichotomy. There are other ways to answer which\n do not\n involve speculation on Wright's personal properties. I would even\n suggest that the question itself is not helpful/applicable to\n understanding a non-fiction thesis.\n\n At the end of the day the fact remains that Wright left a certain\n path unexplored and that demands an explanation. And that is\n lacking. It should have been made explicit from the onset.\n\nWright's thesis stands or falls on its internal logic and ability to\nshed light on the material. It is not dependent on what he didn't do\nexcept in so far as a different theory might be better, and that is a\nseparate argument. It certainly doesn't depend upon any imagined\nreasons for why he did/didn't come to different conclusions." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't think this is getting anywhere. The issue here is that there is a \ndimension to the work that Wright hasn't explored in his \ngenerally-applicable scheme. That simply and definitely demands an \nexplanation. It's as if you were solving a murder mystery, you explained to \nthe public how first appearances could be deceiving, and then sold off \nsecond appearances as the ultimate truth. The question isn't why didn't he \naddress further readings. The question is why didn't he address further \nreadings when he's precisely been showing the importance of further readings \n(if nothing else, to disavow them!). To use your terminology, his thesis may \nfall on not applying its internal logic to its full consequences.\n\nOf course everything serves the purpose of the Increate, so even a failed \nthesis may shed some (or even much) light on things." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " Of course if one views speculation over a person's choices as\n speculation over the person, then any answer will look like just that.\n\nWhen the speculation takes the form of \"Person X made bad choice Y\nbecause they have property Z\" then sure, it looks like that." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Of course, and since it's you who inserted the 'bad' and the 'they have', I \nhave nothing to do with that." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " Craig Brewer has a good post on another thread with the same name\n describing how he sees Wright's method. I agree with him.\n\n Craig's view(s) fall within what I consider(ed) 'inconvenien[ce]' -\n the 'third' interpretation is not interesting (in an epistemological\n sense) from the point of view of Wright's method. Craig may have\n nailed it, but that doesn't mean questions aren't justified.\n\nIf Wright came on the list and said \"Yup, I didn't pursue the 3rd level\nof interpretation because it made me uncomfortable as an atheist\", would" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You seem to be hung on some interpretation of my original remark as \nbelittling atheists. Neither was that my intention nor do I think the issue \nis atheism - though it might be -, I rather think it's methodological \nprejudice. Maybe I should have said 'methodologically \nuncomfortable/inconvenient' and we wouldn't be having this conversation \n(though going by what you say there's no difference).\n\nOf course, no such standards are applied when evaluating anyone else. People \nmention all the time why authors avoided this, ignored that and choked there." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "that be enough? If not, what would be? If so, how does that affect the\ntruth of his thesis? Trying to figure out why he did or didn't make a\nparticular argument based on a personal property is idle speculation." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Take up that issue with all the people who wonder why he didn't develop his \nthesis all the way up, not me - I think I know why, I've explained it \nperhaps thrice now, and I don't think I can add any more the discussion." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6AB3D.6060501@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T20:08:29+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<516772.59521.qm@web37603.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'll take this opportunity to present a couple of points:\n\nCraig Brewer wrote (01-12-2010 17:25):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I generally agree. Or rather, I absolutely agree about things internal\nto the text.\n\nWhen it comes to the author's stated intentions or explanations of a\ntext, though, I'm more conflicted. That's particularly true with Wolfe.\nPersonally, I have to say that any text that can only be understood in\nrelation to something outside of it (an interview, a conversation with\nthe author, etc.) is a flawed text." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I disagree. That's just a property of the text.\n\n(But I think that Wolfe's not such a case.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But the opposite extreme can also be a difficulty when people impose\nbiographical information on a text." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That usually results in inferior work - because the biographical drive is\nstronger than the creative -, but it's not usually the religious writers who \ndo it.\n\n(But I think that Wolfe's not such a case.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "An author has every right to tell us we're wrong about what happens; he\nhas less right to tell us we're wrong about what it means." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Maybe even none at all, and even what happens may be open to discussion." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(To make this relate to Wright, I think he's has every right to read New\nSun *against* the religious meaning many of us might assume Wolfe\nintended." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I strongly disagree. If we susbtitute reader intent for author intent we're\nno better off than where we started." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "If that's the reading the text ultimately supports - and, granted,\nthat's the point of the debate with him - then that's what it supports." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The issue is also that such a rich text can support all kinds of meanings. \n*But only* arrived at through thorough examination. Analysis that stops half \nway will always be half way, even if its same conclusions might be arrived \nat by a further, more thorough, analysis." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "It doesn't matter at all what Wolfe thought he was writing or what we'd\nlike it to mean if the text ultimately goes in a Wright's direction. Lot\nof *IF*s there, of course, but I think it's just really bad logic to say\nthat Wright has to be wrong, a priori, because Wolfe is Catholic or\nbecause he's said in interviews that the book has a \"true\" religious\nmeaning, or what have you. It always has to go back to the best reading\nof the books as we have them.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It's just that I haven't seen anyone say that the books have to be read a\ncertain way because Wolfe intended them that way. The most I've seen is that\nthey should be read a certain way because they're richer that way." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T20:17:29+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF6AB3D.6060501@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wolfe is known as a creator of stories with deception piled upon deception. I think the \npossibility that he, himself, is capable of such layering must be considered. What if\nWolfe was in his deepest heart an atheist or even gnostic, believing that God is ultimately\nthe Great Deceiver. What if his Catholicism was a superficial guise maintained to keep \nharmony in his community, social and family life and his true beliefs are only revealed\nwrapped in layers of mayan veils within his stories. Perhaps Wright's analysis is not a step\nshort but rather a step beyond others in penetrating the layers of lupine mystery.\n \nI'm not saying that's true, I'm just sayin'....Hm. I remember starting a thread last year\ncalled Wolfe as Heretic. I'd better be careful lest this stuff gets taken too seriously..\n \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<403443.3252.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T20:23:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF6AB3D.6060501@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "(To make this relate to Wright, I think he's has every right to read New\nSun *against* the religious meaning many of us might assume Wolfe\nintended." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I strongly disagree. If we susbtitute reader intent for author intent we're\nno better off than where we started." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "True, but that makes both seem paltry. Ultimately, intention is secondary to \nwhatever is in the books. I take it that we have 4+1 books called _The Book of \nthe New Sun_. Interviews, conversations, and whatever else is not within those \ncovers is interesting but ancillary.\n\nIf those the primary texts support his reading, then his reading is valid. \nReader and author intention have to ultimately be judged against the text. If \nWolfe meant one thing but achieved another, that other is what we have. His \nintention is then nice or interesting, but unimportant. Otherwise, when I was a \nteenager, I wrote some masterpieces in intention but not execution... :)\n\n\n\n----- Original Message ----\nFrom: Ant?nio Pedro Marques \nTo: The Urth Mailing List \nSent: Wed, December 1, 2010 2:08:29 PM\nSubject: Re: (urth) academic commentary\n\nI'll take this opportunity to present a couple of points:\n\nCraig Brewer wrote (01-12-2010 17:25):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I generally agree. Or rather, I absolutely agree about things internal\nto the text.\n\nWhen it comes to the author's stated intentions or explanations of a\ntext, though, I'm more conflicted. That's particularly true with Wolfe.\nPersonally, I have to say that any text that can only be understood in\nrelation to something outside of it (an interview, a conversation with\nthe author, etc.) is a flawed text." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I disagree. That's just a property of the text.\n\n(But I think that Wolfe's not such a case.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But the opposite extreme can also be a difficulty when people impose\nbiographical information on a text." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That usually results in inferior work - because the biographical drive is\nstronger than the creative -, but it's not usually the religious writers who do \nit.\n\n(But I think that Wolfe's not such a case.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "An author has every right to tell us we're wrong about what happens; he\nhas less right to tell us we're wrong about what it means." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Maybe even none at all, and even what happens may be open to discussion." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(To make this relate to Wright, I think he's has every right to read New\nSun *against* the religious meaning many of us might assume Wolfe\nintended." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I strongly disagree. If we susbtitute reader intent for author intent we're\nno better off than where we started." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "If that's the reading the text ultimately supports - and, granted,\nthat's the point of the debate with him - then that's what it supports." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The issue is also that such a rich text can support all kinds of meanings. *But \nonly* arrived at through thorough examination. Analysis that stops half way will \nalways be half way, even if its same conclusions might be arrived at by a \nfurther, more thorough, analysis." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "It doesn't matter at all what Wolfe thought he was writing or what we'd\nlike it to mean if the text ultimately goes in a Wright's direction. Lot\nof *IF*s there, of course, but I think it's just really bad logic to say\nthat Wright has to be wrong, a priori, because Wolfe is Catholic or\nbecause he's said in interviews that the book has a \"true\" religious\nmeaning, or what have you. It always has to go back to the best reading\nof the books as we have them.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It's just that I haven't seen anyone say that the books have to be read a\ncertain way because Wolfe intended them that way. The most I've seen is that\nthey should be read a certain way because they're richer that way." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6AF4E.1050807@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T20:25:50+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Lee Berman wrote (01-12-2010 20:17):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Wolfe is known as a creator of stories with deception piled upon deception. I think the\npossibility that he, himself, is capable of such layering must be considered. What if\nWolfe was in his deepest heart an atheist or even gnostic, believing that God is ultimately\nthe Great Deceiver. What if his Catholicism was a superficial guise maintained to keep\nharmony in his community, social and family life and his true beliefs are only revealed\nwrapped in layers of mayan veils within his stories. Perhaps Wright's analysis is not a step\nshort but rather a step beyond others in penetrating the layers of lupine mystery." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "As I just said, in that case it's not a step beyond, it's two steps short. \nOne can get to the step you mention, but one has to go through the \nintermediates." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I'm not saying that's true, I'm just sayin'....Hm. I remember starting a thread last year\ncalled Wolfe as Heretic. I'd better be careful lest this stuff gets taken too seriously.." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Iirc you had a stricter view of the orthodox position that it has, itself." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6B109.4070706@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T20:33:13+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<403443.3252.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Craig Brewer wrote (01-12-2010 20:23):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "(To make this relate to Wright, I think he's has every right to read New\nSun *against* the religious meaning many of us might assume Wolfe\nintended." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I strongly disagree. If we susbtitute reader intent for author intent we're\nno better off than where we started." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "True, but that makes both seem paltry. Ultimately, intention is secondary to\nwhatever is in the books. I take it that we have 4+1 books called _The Book of\nthe New Sun_. Interviews, conversations, and whatever else is not within those\ncovers is interesting but ancillary.\n\nIf those the primary texts support his reading, then his reading is valid.\nReader and author intention have to ultimately be judged against the text. If\nWolfe meant one thing but achieved another, that other is what we have. His\nintention is then nice or interesting, but unimportant. Otherwise, when I was a\nteenager, I wrote some masterpieces in intention but not execution... :)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Again, I don't think such a complex text can ever support a unique reading. \nWhat I think counts is the thoroughness of the analyses rather than the results.\n\nI don't know, at least I am able to appreciate differing and even \ncontradictory analyses simultaneously, if they are supple enough. I \nseriously doubt I'm a rare case.\n\nAnd when it comes to some things, there is just no truth value determinable. \nSay Wolfe got the name for Pas from three completely different sources of \ninspiration. One can't say which was *the* source." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Thomas Bitterman", "address": "tom at bitterman.net" }, "date": "2010-12-01T21:20:59+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF69C94.8020602@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "2010/12/1 Ant?nio Pedro Marques " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Thomas Bitterman wrote (01-12-2010 02:30):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques >\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 18:55):\n\n 2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques \n >>\n\n\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 02:22):\n\n Another way of looking at it. The question is \"How did\n Wright\n miss/not\n include an obvious (and likely superior) interpretation\n that any\n careful\n reader would read?\". The answer is \"Because it made\n him feel\n uncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of arguing\n against the\n author rather than the thesis.\n\n But is it more complimenting to answer \"Because it's above his\n league?\"? I\n certainly don't think that's the case.\n\n That is a false dichotomy. There are other ways to answer which\n do not\n involve speculation on Wright's personal properties. I would even\n suggest that the question itself is not helpful/applicable to\n understanding a non-fiction thesis.\n\n At the end of the day the fact remains that Wright left a certain\n path unexplored and that demands an explanation. And that is\n lacking. It should have been made explicit from the onset.\n\nWright's thesis stands or falls on its internal logic and ability to\nshed light on the material. It is not dependent on what he didn't do\nexcept in so far as a different theory might be better, and that is a\nseparate argument. It certainly doesn't depend upon any imagined\nreasons for why he did/didn't come to different conclusions." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I don't think this is getting anywhere." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I agree, and will be brief." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The issue here is that there is a dimension to the work that Wright hasn't\nexplored in his generally-applicable scheme. That simply and definitely\ndemands an explanation." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And I say it doesn't." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Maybe I should have said 'methodologically uncomfortable/inconvenient' and\nwe wouldn't be having this conversation (though going by what you say\nthere's no difference)." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That is almost exactly the difference. The statement \"Wright's methodology\ndoes not permit a reading in which spiritual beings actually exist\" is very\ndifferent from the statement \"Wright adopted a methodology which prohibits a\nreading in which spiritual beings exist because he is an atheist and that\nsort of reading makes him uncomfortable\". The first is very informative and\nleads to interesting questions such as \"What other methodologies could be\nbrought to bear, and what can they reveal that Wright's did not?\" The\nsecond simply speculates on the author's motives, which is out of place in a\ndiscussion of non-fiction." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T21:36:13+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 1:20 PM, Thomas Bitterman wrote:\nThe statement \"Wright's methodology\ndoes not permit a reading in which spiritual beings actually exist\" is very\ndifferent from the statement \"Wright adopted a methodology which prohibits a\nreading in which spiritual beings exist because he is an atheist and that\nsort of reading makes him uncomfortable\". The first is very informative and\nleads to interesting questions such as \"What other methodologies could be\nbrought to bear, and what can they reveal that Wright's did not?\"? The\nsecond simply speculates on the author's motives, which is out of place in a\ndiscussion of non-fiction." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm sorry, but this is nonsense.\n\nIs it out of place to discuss why Sarah Palin has written her book\n\"America by Heart,\" or why Al Franken wrote \"Lies and the Lying Liars\nWho Tell Them?\"\n\nEven outside politics, the motives of the author can be quite\nsignificant to a work of nonfiction. Any autobiography, for example,\nis clearly motivated.\n\nBut we're talking about literary criticism, and the author's motives\nare clearly out of line here -- aren't they?\n\nI say no. There are entire motivated schools of criticism, as Marxist,\nChristian, deconstructionist, etc., and motivation is _clearly_ of\nimport in reading those critics. (If deconstruction has accomplished\nanything at all, it is to demonstrate that all texts, not just those\ncalled fiction, have ideological and metaphysical underpinnings -- \"we\nare always already within the circle of metaphysics.\")\n\nThus, while your first statement is necessary it is not sufficient: it\nis legitimate, and perhaps even necessary, to ask why chooses\nthe methodology s/he does and not some other methodology. The answer\nto that question is going to be rooted in 's ideology and\nmetaphysics." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6C26C.4070602@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T21:47:24+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Thomas Bitterman wrote (01-12-2010 21:20):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "2010/12/1 Ant?nio Pedro Marques >\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (01-12-2010 02:30):\n\n 2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques \n >>\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 18:55):\n\n 2010/11/30 Ant?nio Pedro Marques \n >\n \n >>>\n\n\n\n Thomas Bitterman wrote (30-11-2010 02:22):\n\n Another way of looking at it. The question is\n \"How did\n Wright\n miss/not\n include an obvious (and likely superior)\n interpretation\n that any\n careful\n reader would read?\". The answer is \"Because\n it made\n him feel\n uncomfortable\". This looks like a clear case of\n arguing\n against the\n author rather than the thesis.\n\n But is it more complimenting to answer \"Because it's\n above his\n league?\"? I\n certainly don't think that's the case.\n\n That is a false dichotomy. There are other ways to\n answer which\n do not\n involve speculation on Wright's personal properties. I\n would even\n suggest that the question itself is not\n helpful/applicable to\n understanding a non-fiction thesis.\n\n At the end of the day the fact remains that Wright left a\n certain\n path unexplored and that demands an explanation. And that is\n lacking. It should have been made explicit from the onset.\n\n Wright's thesis stands or falls on its internal logic and ability to\n shed light on the material. It is not dependent on what he\n didn't do\n except in so far as a different theory might be better, and that\n is a\n separate argument. It certainly doesn't depend upon any imagined\n reasons for why he did/didn't come to different conclusions.\n\n\n I don't think this is getting anywhere.\n\n\nI agree, and will be brief." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "(Could you set up your system so that it prepends quotes with > rather than \nwhat it is that it's using?)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " The issue here is that there is a dimension to the work that Wright\n hasn't explored in his generally-applicable scheme. That simply and\n definitely demands an explanation.\n\nAnd I say it doesn't." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I disagree." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " Maybe I should have said 'methodologically\n uncomfortable/inconvenient' and we wouldn't be having this\n conversation (though going by what you say there's no difference).\n\nThat is almost exactly the difference (...)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Then I apologise for not making it clear in the original." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6C468.6010001@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T21:55:52+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote-\nThus, while your first statement is necessary it is not sufficient: it\nis legitimate, and perhaps even necessary, to ask why chooses\nthe methodology s/he does and not some other methodology. The answer\nto that question is going to be rooted in's ideology and\nmetaphysics." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Analyzing an argument by the supposed motives of the arguer can quickly \ngo off the rails.\n\n From \"Pilgrim's Regress\" by CS Lewis:\n\n \"'Come, come,' said the jailor. \"You must know your catechism by\n now. You, there' (and he pointed to a prisoner little older than a\n boy whose name was Master Parrot), 'what is argument?'\n\n 'Argument,' said Master Parrot, 'is the attempted rationalization of\n the arguer's desires.'\n\n 'Very good,' replied the jailor, 'but you should turn out your toes\n and put your hands behind your back. That is better. Now: what is\n the proper answer to an argument proving the existence of the\n Landlord? The proper answer is, 'You say that because you are a\n Steward'.\n\n 'Good boy. But hold your head up. That's right. And what is the\n answer to an argument proving that Mr. Phally's songs are just as\n brown as Mr. Halfways?'\n\n 'There are two only generally necessary to damnation', said master\n Parrot. 'The first is, \"You say that because you are a Puritan,\" and\n the second is, \"You say that because you are a sensualist.\" '\n\n 'Good. Now just one more. What is the answer to an argument turning\n on the belief that two and two make four?'\n\n 'The answer is, \"You say that because you are a mathematician.\" '\n\n 'You are a very good boy,' said the jailor. \"\n\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Matthew Weber", "address": "palaeologos at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T21:56:52+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF6C468.6010001@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think it's in *God in the Dock *where Lewis refers to this argumentative\nfallacy as \"Bulverism\"." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 1:55 PM, James Wynn wrote:\n\n Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote-\nThus, while your first statement is necessary it is not sufficient: it\nis legitimate, and perhaps even necessary, to ask why chooses\nthe methodology s/he does and not some other methodology. The answer\nto that question is going to be rooted in 's ideology and\nmetaphysics.\n\n\nAnalyzing an argument by the supposed motives of the arguer can quickly go\noff the rails.\n\nFrom \"Pilgrim's Regress\" by CS Lewis:\n\n\"'Come, come,' said the jailor. \"You must know your catechism by now. You,\nthere' (and he pointed to a prisoner little older than a boy whose name was\nMaster Parrot), 'what is argument?'\n\n'Argument,' said Master Parrot, 'is the attempted rationalization of the\narguer's desires.'\n\n'Very good,' replied the jailor, 'but you should turn out your toes and put\nyour hands behind your back. That is better. Now: what is the proper answer\nto an argument proving the existence of the Landlord? The proper answer is,\n'You say that because you are a Steward'.\n\n'Good boy. But hold your head up. That's right. And what is the answer to\nan argument proving that Mr. Phally's songs are just as brown as Mr.\nHalfways?'\n\n'There are two only generally necessary to damnation', said master Parrot.\n'The first is, \"You say that because you are a Puritan,\" and the second is,\n\"You say that because you are a sensualist.\" '\n\n'Good. Now just one more. What is the answer to an argument turning on the\nbelief that two and two make four?'\n\n'The answer is, \"You say that because you are a mathematician.\" '\n\n'You are a very good boy,' said the jailor. \"\n\n\nu+16b9\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andrew Mason", "address": "andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T22:12:20+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "James Wynn wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote-\nThus, while your first statement is necessary it is not sufficient: it\nis legitimate, and perhaps even necessary, to ask why ?chooses\nthe methodology s/he does and not some other methodology. The answer\nto that question is going to be rooted in's ideology and\nmetaphysics." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Analyzing an argument by the supposed motives of the arguer can quickly\ngo off the rails." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "If I understand this discussion correctly, no one is proposing to\nanalyse an argument by the supposed motives of the arguer. What is\nhappening is that people, having decided, by whatever methods are\nthought appropriate, that an argument is not a good one, are in\naddition speculating about what led the arguer to put it forward." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T22:20:43+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 2:12 PM, Andrew Mason\n wrote:\nAnalyzing an argument by the supposed motives of the arguer can quickly\ngo off the rails." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "If I understand this discussion correctly, no one is proposing to\nanalyse an argument by the supposed motives of the arguer. ?What is\nhappening is that people, having decided, by whatever methods are\nthought appropriate, that an argument is not a good one, are in\naddition speculating about what led the arguer to put it forward." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Spot on: my implied distrust of deconstructionism should show that I\nam very much in sympathy with Lewis's position as expressed in the\ndeleted quote. Facts are facts, and the text at hand is what it is and\nnot, for example, what the author may have intended it to be. But to\nsuggest that we might legitimately discuss the work of, say, Fredric\nJameson, without delving into Marxism is ludicrous.\n\nAgain, I have not read Wright, and do not know whether he has an\nexplicit ideological motivation. I'm arguing pure theory here, not\n\"Wright's wrong.\"" }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Son of Witz", "address": "sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org" }, "date": "2010-12-01T22:25:29+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Dec 1, 2010, at 1:20 PM, Thomas Bitterman wrote:\nThat is almost exactly the difference. The statement \"Wright's methodology does not permit a reading in which spiritual beings actually exist\" is very different from the statement \"Wright adopted a methodology which prohibits a reading in which spiritual beings exist because he is an atheist and that sort of reading makes him uncomfortable\". The first is very informative and leads to interesting questions such as \"What other methodologies could be brought to bear, and what can they reveal that Wright's did not?\" The second simply speculates on the author's motives, which is out of place in a discussion of non-fiction." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I sincerely disagree. The second does not simply question motives. One's ideological and cosmological views are rarely motives. Rather they are an invisible frame on that author's perspective. Wright may not have a motive rooted in atheism, but he most certainly might have an actual inability to percieve that which is beyond his belief structure. Coupling this potential (and highly probable) limitation in perspective with the conviction that he has solved the riddle makes it really easy to guess why he stopped where he did, which many or most of us would say falls short of the evident message of BotNS." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6CB90.6020506@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T22:26:24+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn wrote-\n Analyzing an argument by the supposed motives of the arguer can quickly\n go off the rails." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Andrew Mason-\nIf I understand this discussion correctly, no one is proposing to\nanalyse an argument by the supposed motives of the arguer. What is\nhappening is that people, having decided, by whatever methods are\nthought appropriate, that an argument is not a good one, are in\naddition speculating about what led the arguer to put it forward." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Ehh...this topic was not really discussed long or in depth before \nWright's motives were opined.\nSaying \"people, having decided, by whatever methods are thought \nappropriate, that an argument is not a good one\" (without paying \ncritical attention to those methods) is the same as Lewis' definition of \nBulverism:\n\"The modern method is to assume without discussion /that/ he is wrong \nand then distract his attention from this (the only real issue) by \nbusily explaining how he became so silly.\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Dan'l -\nSpot on: my implied distrust of deconstructionism should show that I\nam very much in sympathy with Lewis's position as expressed in the\ndeleted quote. Facts are facts, and the text at hand is what it is and\nnot, for example, what the author may have intended it to be. But to\nsuggest that we might legitimately discuss the work of, say, Fredric\nJameson, without delving into Marxism is ludicrous.\n\nAgain, I have not read Wright, and do not know whether he has an\nexplicit ideological motivation. I'm arguing pure theory here, not\n\"Wright's wrong.\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Since you have been up-front that you haven't read Wright I think it \nwould a drastic mis-reading to think you are arguing anything but pure \ntheory. But delving into Marxism is only useful for reading Jameson in \nthe sense that understanding his arguments requires understanding the \npremises of Marxism. But I hardly think it is necessary to understand \natheism in order to understand Wright's arguments.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T22:36:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF6CB90.6020506@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 2:26 PM, James Wynn wrote:\nSince you have been up-front that you haven't read Wright I think it would a\ndrastic mis-reading to think you are arguing anything but pure theory. But\ndelving into Marxism is only useful for reading Jameson in the sense that\nunderstanding his arguments requires understanding the premises of Marxism.\nBut I hardly think it is necessary to understand atheism in order to\nunderstand Wright's arguments." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Marxism does not only inform Jameson's arguments; it constrains that\nconclusions he is able to reach, and to read him usefully (and\nespecially to read him against other, non-Marxist critics discussing\nthe same works) requires understanding not only the arguments but the\nconstraints. He is (okay: _seems_) incapable of constructing an\nargument or reaching a conclusion which is inconsistent with Marxism.\n\nIs it possible that such a constraint operates in Wright's case?" }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6D1AA.9070507@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T22:52:26+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn - But\ndelving into Marxism is only useful for reading Jameson in the sense that\nunderstanding his arguments requires understanding the premises of Marxism.\nBut I hardly think it is necessary to understand atheism in order to\nunderstand Wright's arguments." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Dan'l -\nMarxism does not only inform Jameson's arguments; it constrains that\nconclusions he is able to reach, and to read him usefully (and\nespecially to read him against other, non-Marxist critics discussing\nthe same works) requires understanding not only the arguments but the\nconstraints. He is (okay: _seems_) incapable of constructing an\nargument or reaching a conclusion which is inconsistent with Marxism.\n\nIs it possible that such a constraint operates in Wright's case?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "But once you have decided to discuss Jameson's motives for his \nconclusions, haven't you changed the subject from analyzing his \narguments to detailing his biography or excoriating the dangers of \nfundamentalist Marxism? The purpose of such analysis would be \"How did \nJameson come to his wonderful/awful arguments?\" or \"Why are Jameson's \nconclusions so horribly stunted?\"\n\nIf you are discussing Jameson's or Wright's arguments then it is as \nirrelevant why they did not offer some other argument as it is to \nspeculate why St. Paul did not preach Confucianism.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6D662.1050002@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T23:12:34+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF6D1AA.9070507@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "James Wynn wrote (01-12-2010 22:52):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "James Wynn - But\ndelving into Marxism is only useful for reading Jameson in the sense\nthat\nunderstanding his arguments requires understanding the premises of\nMarxism.\nBut I hardly think it is necessary to understand atheism in order to\nunderstand Wright's arguments." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Dan'l -\nMarxism does not only inform Jameson's arguments; it constrains that\nconclusions he is able to reach, and to read him usefully (and\nespecially to read him against other, non-Marxist critics discussing\nthe same works) requires understanding not only the arguments but the\nconstraints. He is (okay: _seems_) incapable of constructing an\nargument or reaching a conclusion which is inconsistent with Marxism.\n\nIs it possible that such a constraint operates in Wright's case?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "But once you have decided to discuss Jameson's motives for his\nconclusions, haven't you changed the subject from analyzing his\narguments to detailing his biography or excoriating the dangers of\nfundamentalist Marxism? The purpose of such analysis would be \"How did\nJameson come to his wonderful/awful arguments?\" or \"Why are Jameson's\nconclusions so horribly stunted?\"\n\nIf you are discussing Jameson's or Wright's arguments then it is as\nirrelevant why they did not offer some other argument as it is to\nspeculate why St. Paul did not preach Confucianism." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "But that is not the issue. The issue, as originally stated, is that at a \ncertain point some authors make some conclusions that don't follow from \ntheir premises, or fail to make those that do. Speculating why that happens \nis important because it may always be that their conclusions do match the \npremises after all - but one has to explain why/how -, or the discrepancy is \nreal and only finding a cause for it may lay the matter provisorily at rest." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF6DB31.1070807@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-01T23:33:05+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF6D662.1050002@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "James Wynn wrote-\nIf you are discussing Jameson's or Wright's arguments then it is as\nirrelevant why they did not offer some other argument as it is to\nspeculate why St. Paul did not preach Confucianism." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote-\nBut that is not the issue. The issue, as originally stated, is that at \na certain point some authors make some conclusions that don't follow \nfrom their premises, or fail to make those that do. Speculating why \nthat happens is important because it may always be that their \nconclusions do match the premises after all - but one has to explain \nwhy/how -, or the discrepancy is real and only finding a cause for it \nmay lay the matter provisorily at rest." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think you are building a greater foundation for this issue that truly \nexists. As originally stated there were three posts that all agreed that \nWright's premise that the Increate was an invention of the \nHierogrammates was undermined by the fact that Tzadkiel, Barbatus, and \nFamulimus worshipped Severian. At this point Lee opined:\n\n \"My impression is that Wright interprets BotNS from an atheist point\n of view because he is, himself a devout atheist and perhaps\n unwilling to acknowledge spirituality in the work of an author he so\n admires, despite awareness of Wolfe's religious leanings.\"\n\nOkay. Lee called it an \"impression\", so he is acknowledging that his \nassessment is not especially fact-based. But it would be an awfully \ndamning debility on Wright's part if it were true, so perhaps this \nassessment should require backing-up with a couple quotes. I mean, maybe \nWright was just not overly impressed with the Heiros pretenses of \nobeisance? Many people are not impressed with my wonderful arguments. \nHow convenient would it be for me to opine that they had some \nfundamental bias that prevented them from seeing the noses on their faces?\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Thomas Bitterman", "address": "tom at bitterman.net" }, "date": "2010-12-02T01:06:50+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 4:36 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\n\nOn Wed, Dec 1, 2010 at 1:20 PM, Thomas Bitterman wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "The statement \"Wright's methodology\ndoes not permit a reading in which spiritual beings actually exist\" is very\ndifferent from the statement \"Wright adopted a methodology which prohibits a\nreading in which spiritual beings exist because he is an atheist and that\nsort of reading makes him uncomfortable\". The first is very informative and\nleads to interesting questions such as \"What other methodologies could be\nbrought to bear, and what can they reveal that Wright's did not?\"? The\nsecond simply speculates on the author's motives, which is out of place in a\ndiscussion of non-fiction." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I'm sorry, but this is nonsense." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "At least if we cannot decide on where meaning lies, we can discern\nwhere it doesn't." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Is it out of place to discuss why Sarah Palin has written her book\n\"America by Heart,\" or why Al Franken wrote \"Lies and the Lying Liars\nWho Tell Them?\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "To the extent that those books advance claims about reality the\nmotivations of the authors are irrelevant. I don't make the rules\nabout logical fallacies.\n\nOne might consider anything Palin says to be fiction, however." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I say no. There are entire motivated schools of criticism, as Marxist,\nChristian, deconstructionist, etc., and motivation is _clearly_ of\nimport in reading those critics. (If deconstruction has accomplished\nanything at all, it is to demonstrate that all texts, not just those\ncalled fiction, have ideological and metaphysical underpinnings -- \"we\nare always already within the circle of metaphysics.\")" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That way lies the madness of rejecting Einsteinian relativity because\nit is \"Jewish science\", and Darwinian evolution because it is\n\"bourgeois\".\n\nDeconstruction has demonstrated that deconstructionists can say they\ncan find ideological and metaphysical underpinnings to all texts." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Thus, while your first statement is necessary it is not sufficient: it\nis legitimate, and perhaps even necessary, to ask why chooses\nthe methodology s/he does and not some other methodology. The answer\nto that question is going to be rooted in 's ideology and\nmetaphysics." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It is not legitimate. It is a logical fallacy to judge the validity\nof an argument by referring to the motivations of the person who makes\nthe argument." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T04:11:10+00:00", "subject": "(urth) academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "\"My impression is that Wright interprets BotNS from an atheist point\n of view because he is, himself a devout atheist and perhaps\n unwilling to acknowledge spirituality in the work of an author he so\n admires, despite awareness of Wolfe's religious leanings.\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Okay. Lee called it an \"impression\", so he is acknowledging that his \nassessment is not especially fact-based. But it would be an awfully \ndamning debility on Wright's part if it were true." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nFirst, yes, I can't claim more than having an impression as I haven't\nread Wright's book, cover to cover, though I have read significant \nportions online and read a number of reviews of the book. The portions\nI read had a lot of interesting and even helpful insight.\n \nNext, my apologies. My wording makes it easy to misconstrue my intended\nmeaning. In my opinion, Wright's analysis might be deficient if his\ngoal was simply to write a treatise on Wolfe's auctorial intentions in \nwriting BotNS. But I don't think it was.\n \nInstead, I think Wright's goal was to write an analysis of BotNS from\nhis point of view and in this he produced an interesting and successful\nbook. I can imagine him writing an analysis of the Bible, perhaps both\nTestaments, and finding it brimming with metaphor and allegory for the \nreligious, political and military exploitation of the masses. I would \nnot necessarily consider this a \"poor\" analysis just because it neglected \nto acknowledge the spiritual reality of God.\n \nI guess my contribution was meant more to explain the difference in \ninterpretation between Wright and others rather than to assign a level of\nquality label. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andrew Mason", "address": "andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T14:50:32+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Thomas Bitterman wrote:\nIt is not legitimate. ?It is a logical fallacy to judge the validity\nof an argument by referring to the motivations of the person who makes\nthe argument." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That is a fallacy, without question. However, I remain unconvinced\nthat anyone here is doing it. If someone were to argue 'Wright has\nsuch and such motives; therefore he is wrong', that would be\nfallacious. But what I think people are actually saying is 'Wright is\nwrong' (for reasons that have been extensively discussed over a period\nof years - they don't convince everyone, but they exist). 'Now, how\ncan we explain his coming to this wrong conclusion?' At this point\nmotives become relevant." } ] }, { "message_id": "<178E24A5-F794-431A-98B7-64E15953B256@liftingfaces.com>", "from": { "name": "Ryan Dunn", "address": "ryan at liftingfaces.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T15:34:03+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On Dec 2, 2010, at 9:50 AM, Andrew Mason wrote:\nIt is not legitimate. It is a logical fallacy to judge the validity\nof an argument by referring to the motivations of the person who makes\nthe argument." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "That is a fallacy, without question. However, I remain unconvinced\nthat anyone here is doing it. If someone were to argue 'Wright has\nsuch and such motives; therefore he is wrong', that would be\nfallacious. But what I think people are actually saying is 'Wright is\nwrong' (for reasons that have been extensively discussed over a period\nof years - they don't convince everyone, but they exist). 'Now, how\ncan we explain his coming to this wrong conclusion?' At this point\nmotives become relevant." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The least heartening thing about this whole conversation is that Wright has been deemed wrong or (worse) incapable of comprehending certain spiritual motivations of Wolfe's text strictly because he is reading it from an atheist's perspective.\n\nEven if it happens to influence his logic and/or opinions about the text, should being an atheist preclude him from deducing themes from a story just because they happen to be predicated on God or gods? That's like saying I am not allowed to deem my tire has gone flat because I am not a mechanic. Nevermind the loud shot I heard, or the fact that my car now drives funny, or the clearly torn up, airless piece of rubber hanging from my tire rim.\n\nMy feeling is that the motives behind a persons argument are distantly secondary to the opinion itself. Are we saying an atheist finds nothing of worth in the musings of a Christian? Or that an atheist is incapable of teaching a fallen Christian about faith? Are we saying there is absolutely nothing alluring about socialism to a conservative? Is Wolfe himself not a Catholic who converted in his later life?\n\nWhere does it end? I think it is shameful to think a critic should have an asterisks next to his/her name in order to give those who happen to disagree with their criticisms a way out. \"Oh, look, he's an atheist. See? How could he possibly understand the religious underpinnings of Wolfe's work?\"\n\nI say all of this as a pantheist who was raised Catholic, in case anyone needed asterisks fodder for me.\n\nAnd to the question of motivation as to why Sarah Palin or Bill Clinton or Bill O'Reilly, or Barack Obama, or George W. Bush would write an autobiography, I would suspect that is perhaps the easiest question yet.\n\nAs human beings, all we are is an amalgam of beliefs and codes formed and shaped by others with an equally complex set of beliefs and codes. Everything has an asterisks, everything is motivated by something. The return on investment in going down that habit hole is better served in a court of law, just about the only place where judging thy neighbor is, well, just.\n\n...ryan" } ] }, { "message_id": "<426871.17645.qm@web37602.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T16:46:27+00:00", "subject": "(urth) A quick summary of Wright's Attending Daedalus", "in_reply_to": "<178E24A5-F794-431A-98B7-64E15953B256@liftingfaces.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This is a longish post, but I wrote it because I wanted to make sure that Wright \ndoesn't get short shrift. As I've said before, his book is really worth your \ntime, even if you don't ultimately agree with exactly how his readings end up. \n\n\nI think Wright's argument is actually a bit more robust than those who haven't \nread him might think. It's not that he would be surprised by the religious \nreading of New Sun that predominates in this list. On the contrary: his book \nstarts by recognizing that such is the more common way of reading Wolfe, and \nhe's out to show why it's not necessary wrong, but rather an insufficiently \ncritical way of reading Wolfe on Wolfe's own terms.\n\nI actually pulled out the book (it was buried in a box...took awhile to find), \nand re-read skimmed parts last night. Some random but appropriate quotes:\n\nFirst, right at the beginning, Wright addresses Wolfe's religion:\n\n\"Wolfe's interest in [themes of religious faith and moral choice], which recur \nthroughout his career but most notable in BotNS and BotLS, has led several \ncritics to cite Wolfe's Roman Catholicism as a key element in his composition as \na writer. However, while it is true to say that Wolfe has written at least one \nCatholic story, \"The Detective of Dreams,\" (1980) - a pastiche of Poe - it is \nunwise to accept Wolfe's incorporation of religious themes, symbols and \nnarrative patterns at face value. As Wolfe himself explains: 'I am a Catholic in \nthe real communion-taking sense, which tells you a lot less than you think about \nmy religious beliefs ... I believe in God, in the divinity of Christ and in the \nsurvival of the person ... Like every thinking person, I am still working out my \nbeliefs.' Wolfe's self-portrait is typically evasive, yielding little definitive \ninformation about someone who understands that there are no easy or unequivocal \nanswers to any of the questions that may be asked, of ourselves, or of the world \nat large. Importantly, though, the fact that Wolfe is still 'working out' his \nbeliefs should alert the reader to the danger of any preconceived notions of how \nWolfe will treat religious material. Just as it is imperative to read in the \ncontext the allusions, intertexts and references that inform and suffuse Wolfe's \nficiton, so it is vital to recognise how Wolfe appropriate and recontextualizes \nelements of religious practice, symbolism and belief in his fiction, especially \nin BotNS.\" (p. 11)\n\nWright's book is then not to suggest that Wolfe's books have atheistic messages, \nif by that you think that he means to suggest that BotNS, say, promotes atheism. \nRather, Wright's position is ultimately that even when Wolfe is writing \nsomething that seems to be atheistic, he's ultimately not putting forward a \nparticular theology at all, but, instead, is really just thinking about how \ncomplicated it is to think about religious and mythic matters when they're all \nfiltered through symbols, stories, accounts, memories, and even lies. Wright's \npoint, then, would be that Wolfe's writing is less about what *IS* on the other \nside (it's not putting forth a systematic theology); instead, it's a rumination \non the ways in which we simultaneously know and distort whatever we think of as \ntrue because of all the ways truth has to be mediated to us.\n\nHere's a quick summary of how I think Wright sees that.\n\nIn one passage, after previewing his reading that all \"supernatural\" events are \nactually manipulations of the Hieros, Wright says:\n\n\"There is, however, an inescapable religious aspect to the Urth Cycle. This \nquality does not depend on Wolfe's Roman Catholicism, as some critics have \nsuggested [a note listing a wide range...pardon me for not typing it all out], \nbut on his recognition of the power of myth to shape humanity's secular and \nspiritual life.\" (p. 59)\n\nWright spends his Chapter 7 outlining how he sees Wolfe working out this idea of \nmyth. It is more cynical than I think many people would like to think of Wolfe, \nbut I think it's still appropriate. Here's Wright's summary of his chapter:\n\n\"In the Urth Cycle, the context is obscured by the source material, a fact that \nleads the reader to perceive what the text resembles rather than what it \nactually is: Wolfe uses mythology, he does not create it outside the fictional \nenvironment. He is, in effect, toying with the reader's susceptibility to the \ntranscendental visions of existence offered by mythical narrative. His \nemployment of the monomyth [Campbell and others] exploits the primary \npsychological character of the human species [as Wright thinks Wolfe sees it]: \nits need for myth. Wolfe thereby disarms both the reader's desire and his or her \nability to uncover the disturbing biological reality [that ultimately lies \nbehind the supernatural story of the Urth Cycle].\" (p. 124)\n\nI think it's important to note that Wright is not saying here that Wolfe thinks \nthat all myths are lies. Rather, he's suggesting a point that's ultimately \ncompatible with a more religious reading of Wolfe, and one that he's talked \nabout in many interviews: myths can be both manipulative AND constructive, even \nilluminating, of deeper concerns. Wright simply believes that, in much of his \nwriting, Wolfe is concerned to show how myth can often be misunderstood and \nmisperceived, even when they're also saying something true.\n\nFor example, Wright enjoys the story \"How the Whip Came Back\" (from Book of \nDays) because it essentially shows both the positive and negative capacities of \nmyth. And Wright is always interested in the way that Wolfe mixes myth and \nreligion in his books and suggests that, even when they're doing good, they're \nalso being manipulative (perhaps even manipulating us to be good):\n\n\"The story is important for its attention to two forms of interconnected \nmanipulation: while it implicitly condemns the human tendency to subjugate \nothers, it also recognies the potential of organised religion to recruit and \noperate among a people in need of emotional or spiritual comfort.\" (p. 33) He \nthen notes how the story, which includes a Pope of a dwindling future RC Church \nwho sees an opportunity to renew his flock among a new slave class, actually \nemploys mythic manipulation for higher and even laudable ends. As he says: \"'How \nthe Whip Came Back' contains two principal features that are central to an \nunderstanding of Wolfe's fiction and of the multi-volume novels in particular: \nhis recognition of the existence of systems of control and constraint, and the \nmitigating effects of religious faith.\" (p. 33)\n\nWhat Wright wants to say, though, is that Wolfe's writing is primarily \ninterested in exploring how that manipulation actually works. Wolfe's \nstories-within-stories are ways of teaching readers to see how any myth, even a \ntrue one, can be used all kinds of deceptive ways. But not all deception is \nnecessarily evil. Wright just isn't comfortable coming right out and saying \nthat, behind all of the complicated puzzle-solving and misdirection in Wolfe's \nwork, there is a straightforward claim of either faith or of which myths are \nsimply true and which are simply false.\n\nWright is ultimately always concerned with the difficult and always potentially \nmisleading ways that Wolfe tells stories, emphasizing the difficulty of getting \nthings right. For Wright, BotNS is not ultimately \"just\" a story about atheism \nbecause it says that the Hieros were just manipulating Severian the whole time. \nRather, it's a story about the ways even deeply held religious beliefs, even the \npossibility of actual miracles, can still be manipulated for other ends. I tend \nto think that Wright would say that, ultimately, Wolfe is silent about what's \n\"really\" going on behind the Hieros. Rather, telling that story would be yet \nanother story, capable of being mis-told, mis-appropriated, and even turned on \nits head. In the end, no story is true because the truth always comes before and \nafter the story. Wright just wants us to pay attention to the ways that Wolfe \nmakes us pay attention to how the stories in which we're stuck work in all kinds \nof misleading ways.\n\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF7CF19.1060808@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T16:53:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<178E24A5-F794-431A-98B7-64E15953B256@liftingfaces.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Hi Ryann,\n\nRyan Dunn wrote (02-12-2010 15:34):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The least heartening thing about this whole conversation is that Wright\nhas been deemed wrong or (worse) incapable of comprehending certain\nspiritual motivations of Wolfe's text strictly because he is reading it\nfrom an atheist's perspective." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Who's done that? I haven't seen it. I have seen people say that a strict \natheist perspective precludes a full analysis of the work. That's quite a \ndiferent thing.\n\n(I don't even think it is so myself; I see many so-called atheists unwilling \nto follow certain lines of reasoning, just as one used to see so-called \nreligious people unwilling to follow others, but I don't see that a given \n(ir)religious framework absolutely stunts the analysis of any given work. As \nI said in response to Lee, one may even argue that there is no God in NS - \nsince we're talking about NS - but one has to go through all the hoops first \nto be convincing, unless one is, as it were, preaching to the choir.)\n\n(Whose was that old story in which an atheist managed to become Pope?)" } ] }, { "message_id": "<664863.94043.qm@web37606.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T17:26:02+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF7CF19.1060808@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Antonio said:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "but I don't see that a given (ir)religious framework absolutely stunts the \nanalysis of any given work." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I agree. And, as I tried to say in the summary on Wright, I think his position \nis that either theological interpretation of Wolfe's stuff (as either atheistic \nOR religious) is actually a stunted way to interpret Wolfe. His point is, \nrather, that, whatever theological position lies behind Wolfe's fiction, his \nPRIMARY concern is how those (a)theological positions get mediated and distorted \nthrough stories, myths, memory, time, etc. According to Wright, Wolfe is \nultimately concerned with the difficulties and potential pitfalls of how truths \nget transmitted, no matter whether that truth is atheistic or religious.\n\nIn fact (to throw one more quote up there), he says this is even true of Long \nSun. (By the way, my memory of how Wright dealt with Long Sun was wrong in \nsomething I posted earlier.) Here's Wright's ultimate interpretation of LS:\n\n\"Wolfe's willingness to pervert his own religion, as he does other mythological \nsystems, for the creation of a fictional faith should indicate to the reader \nthat the Christian echoes found in the Urth Cycle must be examined in their \ncontext rather than being accepted as an indication that the text is some form \nof obscure Christian allegory. Indeed The Book of the Long Sun reads very much \nas a renunciation of the orthodoxy and paraphenalia of Roman Catholic worship in \nfavor of the less formulated Christianity of the Apostolic Era.\" (p. 202)\n\nIn other words, Wright essentially says: Long Sun is a Christian work (while New \nSun wasn't, exactly). But it's ultimately, for him, about how the Christian \nmessage can be misremembered and how difficult it is to get back to the original \nmeaning. Wright is always going to get back to how he sees Wolfe being more \ninterested in the difficulties of the medium than the message.\n\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "<455237.94964.qm@web84101.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-12-02T17:32:10+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<178E24A5-F794-431A-98B7-64E15953B256@liftingfaces.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Actually, I'm not sure anyone has argued that Wright's atheism is the issue. In fact, some (myself included) have argued the opposite: that it is something else that caused right to stop at the brink of understanding.\n\n--- On Thu, 12/2/10, Ryan Dunn wrote:\n\nFrom: Ryan Dunn \nSubject: Re: (urth) Academic commentary\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Thursday, December 2, 2010, 10:34 AM" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On Dec 2, 2010, at 9:50 AM, Andrew Mason wrote:\nIt is not legitimate. It is a logical fallacy to judge the validity\nof an argument by referring to the motivations of the person who makes\nthe argument." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "That is a fallacy, without question. However, I remain unconvinced\nthat anyone here is doing it. If someone were to argue 'Wright has\nsuch and such motives; therefore he is wrong', that would be\nfallacious. But what I think people are actually saying is 'Wright is\nwrong' (for reasons that have been extensively discussed over a period\nof years - they don't convince everyone, but they exist). 'Now, how\ncan we explain his coming to this wrong conclusion?' At this point\nmotives become relevant." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The least heartening thing about this whole conversation is that Wright has been deemed wrong or (worse) incapable of comprehending certain spiritual motivations of Wolfe's text strictly because he is reading it from an atheist's perspective.\n\nEven if it happens to influence his logic and/or opinions about the text, should being an atheist preclude him from deducing themes from a story just because they happen to be predicated on God or gods? That's like saying I am not allowed to deem my tire has gone flat because I am not a mechanic. Nevermind the loud shot I heard, or the fact that my car now drives funny, or the clearly torn up, airless piece of rubber hanging from my tire rim.\n\nMy feeling is that the motives behind a persons argument are distantly secondary to the opinion itself. Are we saying an atheist finds nothing of worth in the musings of a Christian? Or that an atheist is incapable of teaching a fallen Christian about faith? Are we saying there is absolutely nothing alluring about socialism to a conservative? Is Wolfe himself not a Catholic who converted in his later life?\n\nWhere does it end? I think it is shameful to think a critic should have an asterisks next to his/her name in order to give those who happen to disagree with their criticisms a way out. \"Oh, look, he's an atheist. See? How could he possibly understand the religious underpinnings of Wolfe's work?\"\n\nI say all of this as a pantheist who was raised Catholic, in case anyone needed asterisks fodder for me.\n\nAnd to the question of motivation as to why Sarah Palin or Bill Clinton or Bill O'Reilly, or Barack Obama, or George W. Bush would write an autobiography, I would suspect that is perhaps the easiest question yet.\n\nAs human beings, all we are is an amalgam of beliefs and codes formed and shaped by others with an equally complex set of beliefs and codes. Everything has an asterisks, everything is motivated by something. The return on investment in going down that habit hole is better served in a court of law, just about the only place where judging thy neighbor is, well, just.\n\n...ryan" } ] }, { "message_id": "<559139.44238.qm@web37602.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T17:38:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<4CF7CF19.1060808@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "All this talk about atheism has me wondering since it's been a couple of years \nnow since I've actually re-read it: are there any passages in New Sun where the \nIncreate acts directly? In Long Sun, obviously, we have Silk's opening vision. \nBut is there anything equivalent with Severian that is (or appears to be) \nsomething that wasn't the Hiero's doing?\n\nThat's probably a difficult question to answer and likely slides easily into \nspeculation. Still, I'm interested.\n\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "<259408.17679.qm@web84103.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-12-02T17:41:17+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF7CF19.1060808@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think I may have read the story just a few months ago. Frank Stockton?\n\n--- On Thu, 12/2/10, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:\n\nFrom: Ant?nio Pedro Marques \nSubject: Re: (urth) Academic commentary\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Thursday, December 2, 2010, 11:53 AM\n\n\n\n(Whose was that old story in which an atheist managed to become Pope?)" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T17:42:53+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<559139.44238.qm@web37602.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think I addressed this obliquely in a recent post.\n\nNo, I don't beleive that there is any place in New Sun, or the\nfirst-person sections of Short Sun where the Increate acts directly.\nThe only (unambiguously?) miraculous events in the entire Solar cycle\nseem to happen when someone who was not present at the event -- Horn\nin Long Sun, the Next Generation in Short Sun -- is doing the\nnarrating.\n\nThis may be significant." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Thu, Dec 2, 2010 at 9:38 AM, Craig Brewer wrote:\nAll this talk about atheism has me wondering since it's been a couple of years\nnow since I've actually re-read it: are there any passages in New Sun where the\nIncreate acts directly? In Long Sun, obviously, we have Silk's opening vision.\nBut is there anything equivalent with Severian that is (or appears to be)\nsomething that wasn't the Hiero's doing?\n\nThat's probably a difficult question to answer and likely slides easily into\nspeculation. Still, I'm interested.\n\n\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4A5D718E-7455-493F-B4C2-C2207821E9DD@liftingfaces.com>", "from": { "name": "Ryan Dunn", "address": "ryan at liftingfaces.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T17:47:33+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Dec 2, 2010, at 12:42 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\nI think I addressed this obliquely in a recent post.\n\nNo, I don't beleive that there is any place in New Sun, or the\nfirst-person sections of Short Sun where the Increate acts directly.\nThe only (unambiguously?) miraculous events in the entire Solar cycle\nseem to happen when someone who was not present at the event -- Horn\nin Long Sun, the Next Generation in Short Sun -- is doing the\nnarrating.\n\nThis may be significant.\n\nOn Thu, Dec 2, 2010 at 9:38 AM, Craig Brewer wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "All this talk about atheism has me wondering since it's been a couple of years\nnow since I've actually re-read it: are there any passages in New Sun where the\nIncreate acts directly? In Long Sun, obviously, we have Silk's opening vision.\nBut is there anything equivalent with Severian that is (or appears to be)\nsomething that wasn't the Hiero's doing?\n\nThat's probably a difficult question to answer and likely slides easily into\nspeculation. Still, I'm interested." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Forgive my ignorance, but was the actual act of restoring the sun an act between Severian and the Increate? Or were the Hiero's responsible for this?\n\nThere is the passage which details the Hierogrammates having to leave one universe for another through a \"side exit\" of sorts, as I recall, which implied they did not have control over its conditions enough to prevent their having to flee.\n\nI just don't remember the mechanics of how the sun was restored, and the ramifications of the subsequent flood.\n\n...ryan" } ] }, { "message_id": "<121639.8347.qm@web37608.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T18:01:09+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Home Fires", "in_reply_to": "<4A5D718E-7455-493F-B4C2-C2207821E9DD@liftingfaces.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "My apologies if this is old news. (I didn't find it in the archives.)\n\nI just noticed that amazon has a listing for _Home Fires_ and a summary:" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Gene Wolfe takes us to a future North America at once familiar and utterly \nstrange. A young man and woman, Skip and Chelle, fall in love in college and \nmarry, but she is enlisted in the military, there is a war on, and she must \nserve her tour of duty before they can settle down. But the military is \nfighting a war with aliens in distant solar systems, and her months in the \nservice will be years in relative time on Earth. Chelle returns to recuperate \nfrom severe injuries, after months of service, still a young woman but not \nnecessarily the same person while Skip is in his forties and a wealthy \nbusinessman, but eager for her return.\n\nStill in love (somewhat to his surprise and delight), they go on a Caribbean \ncruise to resume their marriage. Their vacation rapidly becomes a complex \nseries of challenges, not the least of which are spies, aliens, and battles \nwith pirates who capture the ship for ransom. There is no writer in SF like \nGene Wolfe and no SF novel like Home Fires.\n\nhttp://www.amazon.com/Home-Fires-Gene-Wolfe/dp/0765328186/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1291312749&sr=1-1\n\n\n(Release date is listed as Jan 18.)\n\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T18:02:48+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<4A5D718E-7455-493F-B4C2-C2207821E9DD@liftingfaces.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Thu, Dec 2, 2010 at 9:47 AM, Ryan Dunn wrote:\nForgive my ignorance, but was the actual act of restoring the sun an act between Severian and the Increate? Or were the Hiero's responsible for this?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The sun was restored by its being implanted with the White Fountain,\nSeverian's \"star.\" The WF was created by the mating of Severian and\nApheta, and became his so-to-speak alter ego, linked to him so that he\ncould summon it in the time of the Stone Village to arrive in his own\ntime. At least, that's (in sketch) how I remember it." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andrew Mason", "address": "andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T18:14:19+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Craig Brewer wrote:\nAll this talk about atheism has me wondering since it's been a couple of years\nnow since I've actually re-read it: are there any passages in New Sun where the\nIncreate acts directly? In Long Sun, obviously, we have Silk's opening vision.\nBut is there anything equivalent with Severian that is (or appears to be)\nsomething that wasn't the Hiero's doing?\n\nThat's probably a difficult question to answer and likely slides easily into\nspeculation. Still, I'm interested." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't think there is a place in _New Sun_ where the Increate acts\n_directly_. However, near the end Barbatus claims that Severian's\npower to recall the dead - in the same body, not in a new one - is\ngreater than the power of the Hierogrammates, which suggests that it\ndoes not come from them but from the Increate.\n\n(This might, of course, be part of a deception - produced as evidence\nthat the Increate endorses the Hierogrammates' plan. But if it were,\nit's rather odd that it comes at the end, when Severian has already\nserved his purpose. It's actually quite striking that the original\nexplanation of the plan we get from Malrubius does not mention the\nIncreate at all - the Hierogrammates were created by humans or their\nanalogues, and their motives arise from their own experience; 'this is\nat once their repayment and their revenge'. Severian seems quite happy\nto go along with the plan on this basis. Later we get hints that it's\nmore complicated than that, and that the Increate is involved, in some\nhard-to-determine way; I find it hard to dismiss these as\nmanipulation, because Severian is committed to the plan before they\nstart.)" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF7E44E.6040009@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T18:24:14+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Home Fires", "in_reply_to": "<121639.8347.qm@web37608.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Last year Wolfe said, (or I understood him to say) that Skip's last name \nis Reese [I don't know the spelling]. I asked Wolfe whether that implied \nHF was in the AEG universe. He replied that he didn't think Ries and \n[Rees] were similar. Whatever.\n\n\n[spoiler]\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nWolfe also related that this was a kind of picture of the complexities \nof what people think they want in romance. It seems to Skip and Chelle \nthat this is the perfect situation. When she comes back, she'll be \nmarried to a wealthy, powerful man. He will be married to a beautiful \nyoung woman. But when they are reunited, they discover that their \nrelationship doesn't mesh right anymore...there's 20 years separating them." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T19:07:35+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "craig Brewer: All this talk about atheism has me wondering since it's been a couple of years \nnow since I've actually re-read it: are there any passages in New Sun where the Increate acts \ndirectly? In Long Sun, obviously, we have Silk's opening vision. But is there anything equivalent \nwith Severian that is (or appears to be) something that wasn't the Hiero's doing?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I will disagree that Silk's Outsider possession/vision was the work of the Increate. The fairly\nclear association of The Outsider with Dionysus in RttW suggests this is a deity operating at a\nmuch lower level than the Increate. I could consider The Outsider as a possible god of all Briah.\nBut I don't think he could be the Creator of all universes at all times.\n \nMy impression from UotNS is that there is potentially an infinite number of levels of beings between\nhumanity and The Increate. A being just a couple steps up like Tzadkiel is at a level sufficiently\nsuperior and distant as to make meaningful conversation difficult. The Increate is just too far away\nfrom humanity to communicate directly and must use imperfect translation through intermediaries if\nthere is to be any communication at all.\n \nI agree with Ryan Dunn that we may conclude that Severian's power derives from a source higher than\nthe Hierogrammates, explaining why Tzadkiel has been a Severian acolyte and why Tzadkiel cannot \nrestore a dead human being (or dead Hierogrammate, his son) back to life. Severian's mating with Apheta \nmay have facilitated the creation of the White Fountain star but perhaps only allowed access to a \nhigher power for its creation.\n \nI consider that the black hole in the sun and the White Fountain were created simultaneously in Briah.\nSort of like how pulling a plug from a bucket of water creates a sucking hole inside the bucket but \nfrom outside the bucket, a fountain is created. The time frame of the dying Urth sun was the time it\ntook for Severian to carry the plug from outside the bucket back inside the bucket and plug the hole.\n \nThis may call into question what I think is a bit of lupine gospel: that the black hole was created at\nthe time of Apu Punchau and that Severian's eclipse was the result of Tzadkiel's ship arriving to install \nthe hole. One reason to doubt the gospel is that Tzadkiel's ship seems unable (because of its size\nand gravity? or the nature of its sails?) to come closer than Pluto to our solar system. My alternative\ntheory for the eclipse is that it is akin to the other natural disasters (storm, earthquake) that occur\nwhen Severian is angry or in fear of dying. Rather than Tzadkiel's ship parked in rotation-matching orbit\nfor half a day causing the eclipse perhaps it was a natural event; and the large body Severian used to \ncause the extended eclipse was simply the Moon. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF7EF16.90101@io.com>", "from": { "name": "Jeff Wilson", "address": "jwilson at io.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T19:10:14+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<559139.44238.qm@web37602.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 12/2/2010 11:38 AM, Craig Brewer wrote:\nAll this talk about atheism has me wondering since it's been a couple of years\nnow since I've actually re-read it: are there any passages in New Sun where the\nIncreate acts directly? In Long Sun, obviously, we have Silk's opening vision.\nBut is there anything equivalent with Severian that is (or appears to be)\nsomething that wasn't the Hiero's doing?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The only thing that I can think of is that Severian's potential ability \nto heal and raise the dead is a gift from the Increate in the same way \nJoseph was given the the ability to interpret predictive dreams by G-d. \nIt is indicated in URTH by Sev' recollection of the OT verse describing \nJoseph's own dream as reproduced in the brown book. The parallel is very \nclose, esp in that Joseph needs help from others (their dreams) to \nforetell events outside his own life the way Sev needs to draw on \noutside energies to perform healings on and to raise other people." }, { "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": "<003c01cb9257$49ffc4e0$b9ce4a0c@rclackey>", "from": { "name": "Roy C. Lackey", "address": "rclackey at stic.net" }, "date": "2010-12-02T19:29:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Dan'l wrote:\nNo, I don't beleive that there is any place in New Sun, or the\nfirst-person sections of Short Sun where the Increate acts directly.\nThe only (unambiguously?) miraculous events in the entire Solar cycle\nseem to happen when someone who was not present at the event -- Horn\nin Long Sun, the Next Generation in Short Sun -- is doing the\nnarrating.\n\nThis may be significant." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "If you grant that Silk's enlightenments were supernatural and came from the\nOutsider -- known as the Increate in NS -- then Silkhorn professed an\nencounter with the Outsider when he prayed and sacrificed (bread and wine)\nat an old Neighbor altar on a hill near Blanko. See chapter 19 of IGJ,\nparticularly pages 284-85. Nothing tangible happened, but the context makes\nit quite clear to me -- an unbeliever -- that this incident is evocative of\nthe Christian God and was intended to be perceived as such.\n\n-Roy" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Son of Witz", "address": "sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org" }, "date": "2010-12-02T19:43:25+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Dec 2, 2010, at 11:07 AM, Lee Berman wrote:\nI will disagree that Silk's Outsider possession/vision was the work of the Increate. The fairly\nclear association of The Outsider with Dionysus in RttW suggests this is a deity operating at a\nmuch lower level than the Increate. I could consider The Outsider as a possible god of all Briah.\nBut I don't think he could be the Creator of all universes at all times." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think it's perfectly clear that the Outsider is Christ or logos.\nHe's presented as the REAL diety outside of the false Pantheon." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF80518.80602@io.com>", "from": { "name": "Jeff Wilson", "address": "jwilson at io.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T20:44:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<4A5D718E-7455-493F-B4C2-C2207821E9DD@liftingfaces.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 12/2/2010 11:47 AM, Ryan Dunn wrote:\nThere is the passage which details the Hierogrammates having to leave one universe for another through a \"side exit\" of sorts, as I recall, which implied they did not have control over its conditions enough to prevent their having to flee.\n\nI just don't remember the mechanics of how the sun was restored, and the ramifications of the subsequent flood." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "In their terms, they fled to Yesod from their iteration of Briah to \nescape the Grand Gnab. They subsequently discover they can open \nwormholes back into the current Briah from Yesod, and energy naturally \ntravels through these, similar to the way matter and energy flow through \nblack holes from Briah to Abaddon, the next lower universe. The White \nFountain, then, is an artificial star powered by matter and energy \nflowing through a wormhole from Yesod to Briah. It is guided to the Sun \nby homing in on its spiritual link to Severian, and upon arrival it \nenters the Sun, restoring it to full brightness.\n\nThe flood and quakes are a side-effect of the tidal forces of the huge \nmass and spacewarp passing by, judged necessary by Tzadkiel to disrupt \nthe biological and political leviathans remaining on Urth in order to \ngive humanity a fair second chance on Ushas." }, { "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": "", "from": { "name": "Andrew Mason", "address": "andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T22:43:54+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<4CF80518.80602@io.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Lee Berman wrote:\n\nI will disagree that Silk's Outsider possession/vision ?was the work of the Increate. The fairly\nclear association of The Outsider with Dionysus in RttW suggests this is a deity operating at a\nmuch lower level than the Increate." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That is not clear if Dionysus is seen as a prefiguring of Christ, as\nhe was by C.S. Lewis (as someone commented here recently) - also, by\nthe way, by Wole Soyinka." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF82618.5000707@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T23:04:56+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<003c01cb9257$49ffc4e0$b9ce4a0c@rclackey>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Roy C. Lackey wrote:\nIf you grant that Silk's enlightenments were supernatural and came from the\nOutsider -- known as the Increate in NS -- then Silkhorn professed an\nencounter with the Outsider when he prayed and sacrificed (bread and wine)\nat an old Neighbor altar on a hill near Blanko. See chapter 19 of IGJ,\nparticularly pages 284-85. Nothing tangible happened, but the context makes\nit quite clear to me -- an unbeliever -- that this incident is evocative of\nthe Christian God and was intended to be perceived as such." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm disturbed by the narrator's crude mention, not far away from there, \nthat he had thought of sacrificing Oreb (if no other sacrifice were \navailable?) on a near occasion." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T23:15:41+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<4CF82618.5000707@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Son o'Witz- I think it's perfectly clear that the Outsider is Christ or logos.\nHe's presented as the REAL diety outside of the false Pantheon." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nI could be. But I just can't be sure. I have doubts. A similar discussion cropped\nup recently and I think it was Andrew Mason who pointed to a Christ-figure from a \nstory in Long Sun. He was only a little bit perturbed that in the story, the \nChrist-figure was a man who was possessed by The Outsider while he was doing his \nthing in the Temple.\n \nI was rather more perturbed. Such possession doesn't sound like the modern Christian \nGod to me and this doesn't seem like a casual mistake Wolfe would make.\n \nI think it is possible that Wolfe did not mean for Briah to be a Christian universe. \nBriah seems to be a place where there is not just one true God and human constructed\nfalse ones. It seems to be a place where superhuman beings abound who sometimes take\non the trappings of gods and under the right conditions, are worshiped as such.\n \nI'll again mention the final denouement of BotNS which takes place in the future of\nthe Long and Short Sun stories. After all Severian's efforts and after so many people\nkilled, I would at least hope for Ushas to show signs of being a Christian planet. \nInstead we have a rather gnostic group of four opposite gods, dark and light, male\nand female. And a demon swimming around in the ocean.\n \nMaybe Severian, as Sleeper, will somehow change this to monotheism and get them to \nbelieve in a Savior. But there isn't any hint of it in the text, though there easily\ncould have been. I think it is possible Briah will have to Gnab and Bang into a new\nuniverse before they get a true Jesus. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF82C27.4080805@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T23:30:47+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Son o'Witz- I think it's perfectly clear that the Outsider is Christ or\nlogos. He's presented as the REAL diety outside of the false Pantheon." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Lee-\nI could be. But I just can't be sure. I have doubts. A similar discussion\ncropped up recently and I think it was Andrew Mason who pointed to a\nChrist-figure from a story in Long Sun. He was only a little bit perturbed\nthat in the story, the Christ-figure was a man who was possessed by\nThe Outsider while he was doing his thing in the Temple. I was rather more\nperturbed. Such possession doesn't sound like the modern Christian\nGod to me and this doesn't seem like a casual mistake Wolfe would make." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "It is from the first chapter of Nightside:\n[referring to the merchants] \"He would have to be firm with them, \nextremely firm. Remind them that the Outsider was known to esteem them \nlast among men already--that according to the Writings he had once \n(having possessed and enlightened a fortunate man) beaten them severely \nin person.\"\n\nThis is of course the story of Jesus casting out the money-changers. The \nman in question was not just possessed, he was possessed and \nenlightened. This is about as close as someone with Silk's religious \ntraining would get to describing homoousios.\n\nI wouldn't over-think it.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<660342.83608.qm@web114719.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Jerry Friedman", "address": "jerry_friedman at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2010-12-02T23:48:15+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<4CF82C27.4080805@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "From: James Wynn crushtv at gmail.com\nSon o'Witz- I think it's perfectly clear that the Outsider is Christ or\nlogos. He's presented as the REAL diety outside of the false Pantheon." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think so too." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Lee-\nI could be. But I just can't be sure. I have doubts. A similar discussion\ncropped up recently and I think it was Andrew Mason who pointed to a\nChrist-figure from a story in Long Sun. He was only a little bit perturbed\nthat in the story, the Christ-figure was a man who was possessed by\nThe Outsider while he was doing his thing in the Temple. I was rather more\nperturbed. Such possession doesn't sound like the modern Christian\nGod to me and this doesn't seem like a casual mistake Wolfe would make." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "James Wynn-\n?It is from the first chapter of Nightside:\n[referring to the merchants] \"He would have to be firm with them, extremely \nfirm. Remind them that the Outsider was known to\nesteem them last among men already--that according to the Writings he had once \n(having possessed and enlightened a fortunate\nman) beaten them severely in person.\"\n\nThis is of course the story of Jesus casting out the money-changers. The man in \nquestion was not just possessed, he was possessed >and enlightened. This is \nabout as close as someone with Silk's religious training would get to describing \nhomoousios." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Someone with Silk's training referring to a story possibly altered by the \nChrasmologists that took place in a universe where the Second Person may never \nhave been incarnated (probably wasn't, I think) and where stories echo those of \nour universe but aren't necessarily the same." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I wouldn't over-think it." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Can a mailing list have a motto?\n\nActually, thinking about these things is fun, as Lee reminds us, but I'm also in \nfavor of remembering the distinction between \"resembles\" and \"is\".\n\nJerry Friedman\n\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Jeff Wilson", "address": "jwilson at io.com" }, "date": "2010-12-03T01:02:02+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Lee Berman quoth:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I think it is possible that Wolfe did not mean for Briah to be a Christian\nuniverse.\nBriah seems to be a place where there is not just one true God and human\nconstructed\nfalse ones. It seems to be a place where superhuman beings abound who\nsometimes take\non the trappings of gods and under the right conditions, are worshiped as\nsuch." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This is no different from Wolfe's stated view of the real world, which he\nconsideres Christian." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I'll again mention the final denouement of BotNS which takes place in the\nfuture of\nthe Long and Short Sun stories. After all Severian's efforts and after so\nmany people\nkilled, I would at least hope for Ushas to show signs of being a Christian\nplanet.\nInstead we have a rather gnostic group of four opposite gods, dark and\nlight, male\nand female. And a demon swimming around in the ocean." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Again, this is in keeping with Wolfe's view of how human belief has\ndeveloped from animistic beginnings through increasingly involved myth and\nlegend before being ready into Christianity. Keeping the author's stated\nbeliefs in mind, these are the least speculative aspects of the BOTNS." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF85F31.4040806@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "James Wynn", "address": "crushtv at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-03T03:08:33+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<660342.83608.qm@web114719.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I wouldn't over-think it." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Can a mailing list have a motto?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "heh heh" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Actually, thinking about these things is fun, as Lee reminds us, but \nI'm also in favor of remembering the distinction between \"resembles\" \nand \"is\"." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Eh...I suppose. I just think that this quote is like the picture of the \nastronaut on the moon or the statue of Blind Justice. The reader is \nsupposed to recognize it and take pleasure in the recognition. Once \nagain, people find certain readings viscerally appealing aside from what \nis detectable from the text. Personally, I don't get any added enjoyment \nfrom the books by thinking of it them in another universe. And if I did, \nI don't get any enjoyment in thinking that Silk's vision of Jesus on the \ncross or the references to the Gospel are some sort of analog. If his \nmust be a different future than my own, I'd prefer to believe that in \nSilk's Briah, the Gospels are mythology (delivering a true message from \nanother universe) and the Outsider showed Silk the crucifixion from \nanother universe iteration. In short, I enjoyed recognizing the actual \nastronauts in front of an actual American flag in tBotNS.\n\nu+16b9" } ] }, { "message_id": "<18EC346D-21D2-436F-B22A-FBAAE25A938D@butcherbaker.org>", "from": { "name": "Son of Witz", "address": "sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org" }, "date": "2010-12-03T04:08:51+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Dec 2, 2010, at 3:15 PM, Lee Berman wrote:\nI'll again mention the final denouement of BotNS which takes place in the future of\nthe Long and Short Sun stories. After all Severian's efforts and after so many people\nkilled, I would at least hope for Ushas to show signs of being a Christian planet. \nInstead we have a rather gnostic group of four opposite gods, dark and light, male\nand female. And a demon swimming around in the ocean." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "When Severian learns about the nascent cosmology of Ushas from the man who feeds E Sleeper, he tries to enlighten them a bit.\n\n\"There is no God but the Increate, all the rest being his creatures.\" I was tempted to add, \"Even Tzadkiel,\" but I did not. \"Yes,\" he said. And he turned his face away, not wishing, I think, to see my look if he offended me. \"That is so for the gods, certainly. But for humble creatures like men, there are lesser gods, possibly. To poor, wretched men these lesser gods are very, very exalted. We strive to please them.\" I smiled to show I was not angry. \"" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee Berman", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-03T04:21:07+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<18EC346D-21D2-436F-B22A-FBAAE25A938D@butcherbaker.org>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Andrew Mason: ...if Dionysus is seen as a prefiguring of Christ..." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes. The direction my own thoughts have been going lately. But if Briah is our\nuniverse, a Christian universe, why do we see a Dionysian figure 30,000\n(or whatever it is) years after the birth of Christ? Perhaps we can postulate that\nChristianity died out on Earth/Urth and has to go through certain stages to regain\nit. Or, as Wolfe has said in interviews, we can view this as another, cosmically earlier\nuniverse than ours, perhaps one which has never had a Savior.\n\nMust I choose? Or can I continue to accept both possibilities simultaneously?\nMust I feel compelled to weigh the evidence, pick a \"most likely\" and commit myself and\nmy eternal faith to that interpretation?\n\nNormally I don't think my own worldview or beliefs are important in here but since in this\nsituation they are paralleled regarding a fictional world, perhaps they are worth mentioning.\nI think Roy recently described himself as a \"non-believer\" I wonder if he would own to the extra\nstep of \"disbeliever\". I wouldn't for myself. I am comfortable running the \"God created Man\"\nmental scenario of the universe as well as the \"Man created God\" scenario; both simultaneously if\nnecessary. I don't think I need to choose one. There is one thing I know for sure and that\nis if God created me for a purpose, it involves me being an agnostic. There is nothing truer or\ndeeper to my core than that. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF8D028.1020106@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-03T11:10:32+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Lee Berman wrote (03-12-2010 04:21):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(...) I think Roy recently described himself as a \"non-believer\" I\nwonder if he would own to the extra step of \"disbeliever\". I wouldn't\nfor myself. I am comfortable running the \"God created Man\" mental\nscenario of the universe as well as the \"Man created God\" scenario; both\nsimultaneously if necessary." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I think that's not uncommon. In fact I think that's the natural state of man." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I don't think I need to choose one. (...)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And much frustration in a lot of people's lives derives from trying to\nimpose such a choice." } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF92502.9080400@gmail.com>", "from": { "name": "António Pedro Marques", "address": "entonio at gmail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-03T17:12:34+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<259408.17679.qm@web84103.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "DAVID STOCKHOFF wrote (02-12-2010 17:41):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I think I may have read the story just a few months ago. Frank Stockton?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Do you have the title? I can't remember anymore, it was several years ago. \nI'm not sure the style was Stockton's - who, by the way, I should probably \nread one of these days, I think I browsed in translation ages back." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "--- On *Thu, 12/2/10, Ant?nio Pedro Marques //* wrote:\n\n\n From: Ant?nio Pedro Marques \n Subject: Re: (urth) Academic commentary\n To: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \n Date: Thursday, December 2, 2010, 11:53 AM\n\n\n\n (Whose was that old story in which an atheist managed to become Pope?)\n\n _______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<4CF92C97.7070303@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2010-12-03T17:44:55+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Academic commentary", "in_reply_to": "<4CF92502.9080400@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I can't find it---it wasn't Stockton. The one I'm thinking of actually \nconcerns how the Devil became Pope, or made a wizard Pope, simply by \nbeing a practicing necromancer and acting in as depraved a manner as \npossible. The Cardinals were jealous and tried to kill him by black \nmagic, but there were several twists. Damned if I can remember who wrote it!\n\nProbably not the one James is thinking of." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 12/3/2010 12:12 PM, Ant?nio Pedro Marques wrote:\nDAVID STOCKHOFF wrote (02-12-2010 17:41):" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I think I may have read the story just a few months ago. Frank Stockton?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Do you have the title? I can't remember anymore, it was several years \nago. I'm not sure the style was Stockton's - who, by the way, I should \nprobably read one of these days, I think I browsed in translation ages \nback." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "--- On *Thu, 12/2/10, Ant?nio Pedro Marques //* \nwrote:\n\n\n From: Ant?nio Pedro Marques \n Subject: Re: (urth) Academic commentary\n To: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \n Date: Thursday, December 2, 2010, 11:53 AM\n\n\n\n (Whose was that old story in which an atheist managed to become \nPope?)\n\n _______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andrew Mason", "address": "andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com" }, "date": "2010-12-03T19:44:05+00:00", "subject": "(urth) God/Increate in the New Sun", "in_reply_to": "<4CF8D028.1020106@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Lee Berman wrote:\n\nI could be. But I just can't be sure. I have doubts. A similar discussion cropped\nup recently and I think it was Andrew Mason who pointed to a Christ-figure from a\nstory in Long Sun. He was only a little bit perturbed that in the story, the\nChrist-figure was a man who was possessed by The Outsider while he was doing his\nthing in the Temple." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Actually, I was not perturbed at all, because I don't think the error\nis Wolfe's. As I read it, Silk is remembering a story from the\nChrasmologic Writings. The authors of the Writings were not Christians\n(or Muslims, or Stoics, or members of any of the other movements they\nused as sources), so they would naturally tell the story in terms\nthey thought their readers would find plausible." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I'll again mention the final denouement of BotNS which takes place in the future of\nthe Long and Short Sun stories. After all Severian's efforts and after so many people\nkilled, I would at least hope for Ushas to show signs of being a Christian planet.\nInstead we have a rather gnostic group of four opposite gods, dark and light, male\nand female. And a demon swimming around in the ocean.\n\nMaybe Severian, as Sleeper, will somehow change this to monotheism and get them to\nbelieve in a Savior." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Severian says there is a single God, the Increate, and the priest\nagrees with him in principle, saying that this is true for the gods,\nbut for ordinary people there are other gods who are very great and\ndeserve to be honoured. This seems to link up with the description of\nthe Outsider (in the list of names in _Exodus_) as 'the God of gods'.\n\nWolfe is said to believe that pagan gods exist. This does not stop him\nbeing a monotheist in the sense of believing in only one God, in the\nsense that the traditional monotheistic faiths conceive of God. (And a\nlot of ancient pagans _did_ believe in a single creator God, with the\nother gods being either aspects of him or subordinate beings.) The\nposition that Severian's community have reached at the end of _Urth_\nmay not seem inappropriate to him - though I think he does probably\nexpect it to develop further." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Joe Bushong-Taylor", "address": "joebt01 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-01-18T06:45:30+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Home Fires", "in_reply_to": "<4CF7E44E.6040009@gmail.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Just a reminder that Home Fires is released today. I have been looking\nforward to this one for quite a while, and I have promised myself to read\nonly a chapter per day. I look forward to reading member comments about Home\nFires!" } ] } ] }