{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/62", "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": 62, "subject": "Wolfe's women", "messages": 3, "voices": 3, "first": "1997-06-19T17:23:54+00:00", "last": "1997-06-20T00:05:12+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Joel Priddy", "address": "jpriddy at saturn.vcu.edu" }, "date": "1997-06-19T17:23:54+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wolfe's women", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "mantis say:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Let's see, you wrote: \"Wolfe's women do seem to have a" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "kind of limited repertoire: the Stand-In for Divine Love, the Sex\nObject, and Agent of Destruction.\" Since I don't want to put\nwords\nin your screen, please expand a little on this by first\nidentifying\nwhich one of the three types goes to each of the following:\n[specific list of women deleted]\nSecond, please enumerate the types available to Wolfe's men, so\nthat\nwe may compare and contrast these two sets (assuming that they\naren't the same).<<\n\nYeesh, mantis, you mean I need to actually back up the things I\nsay? \n\nWell, let's see if I can get my muddle of thoughts straight...\nBasically, Wolfe's protagonists seem to be men (I repeat that I\nhaven't read past the first two pages of Pandora), and women\nrelate to them in kind of standard ways. The man is usually on a\nquest for Divine Love, and sex with women seems to be the\npreferred metaphor for this search. \n But (with the possible exception of Apheta), they are not\nDivine Love, so there is often a sinister quality to the women in\ntheir position as False Attempts At Divine Love. I refer again to\nSeverian stating that women love men, but must destroy them.\nAlso, there's Candy in _Free_Live_Free_ , who says that men come\nto her BECAUSE she's physically repulsive (Candy has two of the\nmost common attributes of Wolfe's women: she's a whore and a\nglutton. not as many gluttonous women in Wolfe's writing as\nwhores, but enough to have struck me as a reoccurring motif. Take\nhis female gods at the end of _Urth_). \n Women, in there failure to be Divine Love, have three areas of\nemphasis: (1) The Stand-in is largely benign, but still not the\nfinal solution (say, maybe, Valeria); (2) The Sex Object is not\nactively malign, but very empty, perhaps emphasizing the futility\nof trying to find Divine Love through sex (Jolenta); (3) The\nAgent of Destruction. Focusing the sinister, or even Infernal,\nside of women's failure to be God, willfully leading the man even\nfurther away from there goal (Agia).\n Maybe this just goes back to the protagonist being male, and\nmany men having a somewhat limited range of relationships with\nwomen. And there may be similar limitation on his men, but it\nhasn't struck me in quite the way it has with his women. \n To be perfectly clear, I am not saying that Wolfe is sexist,\nbut his writing does seem to be from a particularly masculine\nviewpoint. And I'm not faulting his writing either. William S.\nBurroughs' women strike me as being all evil Mother-figures, but\nhe's still a writing god. And, because Wolfe is a good writer,\nthere are exceptions to the above: women who are just characters.\n But, it comes down to this: _Peace_ is the only Wolfe book I've\never lent to female friends and received a positive response. And\nthe sticking point usually seems to be the portrayal of women.\n\n While I'm in this mode, I'll make another observation that I\nprobably won't be able to back up...\n Wolfe is a writer who can let a tremendous amount of detail\nabout his characters just hang for a long time. Things like: are\nthey aliens? Robots? If they're cyborgs, are the organics\noriginal or the grafts? And yet he never seems to be able to\nresist calling a black character capitol \"B\" Black over and over\nagain. In _Peace_ or even (I suppose) the Latro books this seems\njust like a historically accurate representation of the\nnarrator's response, but it seems to be pretty much everywhere in\nhis writing. He didn't beat us over the head with the ethnicity\nof the autocthons. In fact, he never seems to mention ethnicity\nunless a character is \"Black.\"\n I'm not trying to be sensitive or judgmental here, just this is\nsomething I've observed, and am not sure why it is so.\n\nHas anyone else noticed either of these tendencies in Wolfe's\nwork?\n\n-cephalothorax-" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "m.driussi", "address": "m.driussi at genie.com" }, "date": "1997-06-19T21:13:00+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Wolfe's women", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Reply: Item #2682162 from URTH at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET01#\n\nCephalothorax,\n\nWell obviously I'm at a loss if you decline to answer my specific\nquestions (about men and women) regarding your generalizations (about\nwomen). So we'll just drop it.\n\nRe: Blackness. I'm not going to say anymore than point out that your\nassertion \"he [Wolfe] never seems to mention ethnicity unless a\ncharacter is `Black'\" conflicts with my tracking of \"Celtic\"\nethnicity within Wolfe's work. Same books, different readers: The\nEnd.\n\nRe: William Burroughs, yes, one of his great strengths is that his\nsavage satire (campy/vampy/grotesque) is rigorously equal opportunity--\nto the point that I'm somewhat surprised that nobody has every used his\ntexts as a blistering damnation of homosexuality. Not exactly \"gay\npride,\" that fellow Bill's books.\n\n=mantis=" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Jim Jordan", "address": "jbjordan at gnt.net" }, "date": "1997-06-20T00:05:12+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Wolfe's women", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 01:23 PM 6/19/97 EDT, Kefalothorax wrote:\nWell, let's see if I can get my muddle of thoughts straight...\nBasically, Wolfe's protagonists seem to be men (I repeat that I\nhaven't read past the first two pages of Pandora), and women\nrelate to them in kind of standard ways. The man is usually on a\nquest for Divine Love, and sex with women seems to be the\npreferred metaphor for this search. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\tI think this is often the case. A fairly clear example is There Are Doors.\nMy initial reading took Lara/Laura and the whole World of Woman in a very\nnegative way. I now think that the World of Women exists in the perceptions\nof the main character, who is afraid of women, and who sees his girlfriend\nin a variety of fearful and wondrous ways. Except that all this becomes\nkind of real for him (just where is the border between psychology and\nfantasy-reality in this novel?). Finally, he sees her as a living doll.\nThus, the World of Women and Lara/Laura are not evil, but the protagonist\nis just plain scared of women (as all men are). Mama at the Italian\nRestaurant (the church) tries to help him get over this fear." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " But (with the possible exception of Apheta), they are not\nDivine Love," }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\tApheta is not divine love. Wolfe told me that Severian is on the quest,\nbut has never found it. I'm inclined to think that the Heirogrammates may\nbe rather more sinister than appears at first glance -- or at least a mixed\nbag. Happily, the Increate has His own designs.... (Compare \"The Detective\nof Dreams\" for the basic scenario.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "so there is often a sinister quality to the women in\ntheir position as False Attempts At Divine Love. I refer again to\nSeverian stating that women love men, but must destroy them.\nAlso, there's Candy in _Free_Live_Free_ , who says that men come\nto her BECAUSE she's physically repulsive (Candy has two of the\nmost common attributes of Wolfe's women: she's a whore and a\nglutton. not as many gluttonous women in Wolfe's writing as\nwhores, but enough to have struck me as a reoccurring motif. Take\nhis female gods at the end of _Urth_). " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\tWell, pathetic Candy is a mess all right, but she is also on a quest for\nlove and freedom. With her companions she is trying to follow the yellow\nbrick road out of the insanity and tyranny of modern America (Oz) to the\nformer freedom offered by Been Free in the abandoned aeroplane in the sky\n(the church). At the end of the book, she and her companions have indeed\nfound something...." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " Women, in there failure to be Divine Love, have three areas of\nemphasis: (1) The Stand-in is largely benign, but still not the\nfinal solution (say, maybe, Valeria);" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\tYes. Wolfe confirmed this to me." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(2) The Sex Object is not\nactively malign, but very empty, perhaps emphasizing the futility\nof trying to find Divine Love through sex (Jolenta); (3) The\nAgent of Destruction. Focusing the sinister, or even Infernal,\nside of women's failure to be God, willfully leading the man even\nfurther away from there goal (Agia).\n Maybe this just goes back to the protagonist being male, and\nmany men having a somewhat limited range of relationships with\nwomen. And there may be similar limitation on his men, but it\nhasn't struck me in quite the way it has with his women. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\tI think you're right. I initially took Anne Schildler (Castleview) in a\nnegative light, but she's looking for the Castle (church; kingdom of God)\nalso. Thus, I think it is mainly a matter of Wolfe's writing primarily\nabout male protagonists. " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " To be perfectly clear, I am not saying that Wolfe is sexist,\nbut his writing does seem to be from a particularly masculine\nviewpoint." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\tOne of the interesting things about Wolfe's fiction is that he takes the\ndifferences between men and women seriously. His characters are often less\nthan universal (unlike most of literature), but rather are masculine or\nfeminine. I suspect this arises from his religious beliefs. It makes his\nfiction rather startling in places. Severian becomes a more universal\nfigure only by incorporating a resurrected Thecla into himself." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " But, it comes down to this: _Peace_ is the only Wolfe book I've\never lent to female friends and received a positive response. And\nthe sticking point usually seems to be the portrayal of women." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\tOne of my questions for Wolfe in my interview with him (and I don't think\nthis went into the final version) was that I could see that women could\ncharge him with being anti-woman. I provided illustrations: There seem to\nbe a lot of bad women in his books. He objected to this, and declared that\nhe did not intend to distribute badness unevenly. And then it became clear\nthat Lara and Anne Schindler are not so bad after all....\n\tI mention this to say that I think such perceptions are not unique.\n\nNutria" } ] } ] }