Subject: (urth) Sorcerer's House Comment

From: Fred Kiesche <godelescherbach at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 03 May 2012 20:18:07 +0000

=====

*What was the last truly great book you read?*

?The Sorcerer’s House, by Gene Wolfe, amazed me. It was such a cunning
book, and it went so deep. A foxy fantasy about a house that grows, with
chapters that are the Greater Trumps of a tarot deck.
=====

-- 
F.P. Kiesche III  "Ah Mr. Gibbon, another damned, fat, square book. Always,
scribble, scribble, scribble, eh?" (The Duke of Gloucester, on being
presented with Volume 2 of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.)
Blogging at The Lensman's Children (
http://theeternalgoldenbraid.blogspot.com/).
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From: Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 03 May 2012 20:44:24 +0000

> chapters that are the Greater Trumps of a tarot deck.

Hm, we didn't think it was very deep - Bax was indeed the evil twin
who by the end murders his brother and usurps his wife and
possessions, just like Emlyn was the evil twin and Ieyuan
misunderstood. Maybe we missed something by not looking at the Greater
Trumps?

-- 
gwern
http://www.gwern.net

---

From: Fred Kiesche <godelescherbach at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 03 May 2012 20:46:45 +0000

Or...we have read a lot of Wolfe. Gaiman is talking to an audience who
probably has never heard of Wolfe. So he might be aiming his remarks to get
folks interested and actually pick up a book.

On Thu, May 3, 2012 at 4:44 PM, Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com> wrote:

> > “The Sorcerer’s House, by Gene Wolfe, amazed me. It was such a cunning
> Trumps”
> _______________________________________________
> Urth Mailing List
> To post, write urth at urth.net
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From: Daniel Petersen <danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 03 May 2012 21:00:02 +0000

Aside from some of his own great stuff, I'll never stop liking and being
grateful to Neil for bigging up my two faves:  Wolfe and Lafferty.  From
the same interview:

*If you could meet any writer, dead or alive, who would it be? What would
you want to know? Have you ever written to an author?*

As a teenager I wrote to R. A. Lafferty. And he responded, too, with
letters that were like R. A. Lafferty short stories, filled with elliptical
answers to straight questions and simple answers to complicated ones.

He was a sui generis writer, the oddest and most frustratingly delightful
of American tall-tale tellers. Not a lot of people have read him, and even
fewer like what he wrote, but those of us who like him like him all the
way. We never met.

The last time I wrote to Lafferty, he had Alzheimer’s and was in a home in
Oklahoma, shortly before his death, and I do not believe he read or
understood the letter, but it made me feel like I was doing something right
by writing it and sending it.

-DOJP

On Thu, May 3, 2012 at 9:18 PM, Fred Kiesche <godelescherbach at gmail.com>wrote:

>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/06/books/review/neil-gaiman-shares-his-reading-habits.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all
>
> =====
>
>
> F.P. Kiesche III  "Ah Mr. Gibbon, another damned, fat, square book.
> Always, scribble, scribble, scribble, eh?" (The Duke of Gloucester, on
> being presented with Volume 2 of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.)
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From: nate jarvis <natejarv at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 04 May 2012 12:56:05 +0000

Was it 2 sets of twins in TSH? Or did they send one human and a
changeling back to the real world and keep one human and a changeling
in faerie (ie, is Bax a changeling, or a human, and if he's a human is
one the twins from faerie his brother and the other a changeling meant
to pass as him?)

Nate.

---

From: Antonin Scriabin <kierkegaurdian at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 04 May 2012 13:38:19 +0000

Neil Gaiman rubbed shoulders with a bunch of big writers (Wolfe, Lafferty,
Douglas Adams).  I have liked his stuff for the most part, although
American Gods and Neverwhere weren't anywhere near as good as Sandman or
Fragile Things.

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From: Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, 04 May 2012 14:26:02 +0000

I tend to agree. He always seems best when he's doing something oblique, like collaborating or writing for varied formats. I don't think that's a bad thing because parts of Sandman stand up with the best sf writing. But he's always described himself more as a storyteller in something of an old fashioned sense rather tha "a writer," and I think that's apt.

I also think of him as a channeler of other things to broader audiences. That's not only because he always promos people I like, but even stuff like Sandman brought some "literary" stuff to comics, and it brought non-comics readers to graphic novels, etc. He makes people who don't like genre stuff...like genre stuff, and that's a good thing. He also just seems to me like a guy who "gets it" in all the right ways, both in terms of knowing what's good (anything he edits is worth the price) and in knowing what he does best for the most part.

On May 4, 2012, at 8:38 AM, Antonin Scriabin <kierkegaurdian at gmail.com> wrote:

> Neil Gaiman rubbed shoulders with a bunch of big writers (Wolfe, Lafferty, Douglas Adams).  I have liked his stuff for the most part, although American Gods and Neverwhere weren't anywhere near as good as Sandman or Fragile Things.
> 
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From: Darth Ed <darthed77 at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 04 May 2012 14:33:07 +0000

On May 3, 2012, at 4:44 PM, Gwern Branwen wrote:
> Maybe we missed something by not looking at the Greater Trumps?

I think so. I'd certainly be interested in the definitive Tarot reading of
TSH. I'm not sure anyone has quite cracked it yet, other than perhaps
Gaiman.

Gaiman has mentioned the similarities to the Tarot before in his review of
TSH on GoodReads (http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/97189634), and it's
been discussed on this mailing list by Dave Stockhoff, Dave Tallman, and
others. Dave Tallman got the furthest, I think. Relevant links:

http://lists.urth.net/pipermail/urth-urth.net/2010-April/014621.html
http://lists.urth.net/pipermail/urth-urth.net/2010-April/014624.html
http://lists.urth.net/pipermail/urth-urth.net/2010-April/014631.html

But, alas, the topic is dropped just as the list starts to make some
progress.

Background for those who missed the Tarot discussion the first time:

Wikipedia says: "The Major Arcana (greater secrets), or trump cards,
consists of 22 cards without suits: The Fool, The Magician, The High
Priestess, The Empress, The Emperor, The Hierophant, The Lovers, The
Chariot, Strength, The Hermit, Wheel of Fortune, Justice, The Hanged Man,
Death, Temperance, The Devil, The Tower, The Star, The Moon, The Sun,
Judgement, and The World."

There are 44 letters/chapters in TSH, exactly twice the number of cards in
the Major Arcana. Two of the letters (letters 22 and 23) have the same
title ("Silver Bullets"). Presumably, we have a double deck of the Major
Arcana with each letter can be associated with one of the cards of the
Major Arcana in some fashion. Also, the repetition of "Silver Bullets" at
exactly the midpoint of the book implies a thematic mirroring relationship
to the letters on either side of the midpoint.

Hope this spurs some additional analysis,
Ed

My WolfeWiki profile:  http://www.wolfewiki.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php?n=Profiles.DarthEd

---

From: Marc Aramini <marcaramini at yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, 04 May 2012 14:41:58 +0000

--- On Fri, 5/4/12, Darth Ed <darthed77 at gmail.com> wrote:
 I'm not sure anyone has quite cracked it yet, other
> than perhaps

I've never been convinced that Gaiman is necessarily a great interpretive analyst.  His strengths are elsewhere.

---

From: Daniel Petersen <danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 04 May 2012 15:30:40 +0000

I think *Anansi Boys* is his best novel, far tighter than *American
Gods*(you can feel a lot of both Wolfe's and Lafferty's influences in
those two
novels I think).  He is, though, like you've noted he acknowledged, a
better 'storyteller' than 'writer' and best as a sort of artist-activist
who gets great things known to diverse audiences.  You can't help but like
the guy.

-DOJP

On Fri, May 4, 2012 at 3:26 PM, Craig Brewer <cnbrewer at yahoo.com> wrote:

>  I tend to agree. He always seems best when he's doing something oblique,
> like collaborating or writing for varied formats. I don't think that's a
> bad thing because parts of Sandman stand up with the best sf writing. But
> he's always described himself more as a storyteller in something of an old
> fashioned sense rather tha "a writer," and I think that's apt.
>
> I also think of him as a channeler of other things to broader audiences.
> That's not only because he always promos people I like, but even stuff like
> Sandman brought some "literary" stuff to comics, and it brought non-comics
> readers to graphic novels, etc. He makes people who don't like genre
> stuff...like genre stuff, and that's a good thing. He also just seems to me
> like a guy who "gets it" in all the right ways, both in terms of knowing
> what's good (anything he edits is worth the price) and in knowing what he
> does best for the most part.
>
>
>   Neil Gaiman rubbed shoulders with a bunch of big writers (Wolfe,
> Lafferty, Douglas Adams).  I have liked his stuff for the most part,
> although American Gods and Neverwhere weren't anywhere near as good as
> Sandman or Fragile Things.
>
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From: Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 04 May 2012 15:32:57 +0000

On Fri, May 4, 2012 at 10:41 AM, Marc Aramini <marcaramini at yahoo.com> wrote:
> I've never been convinced that Gaiman is necessarily a great interpretive analyst. ?His strengths are elsewhere.

The book *is* dedicated effusively to Gaiman by Wolfe; it's not
unreasonable to think that Wolfe targeted it at Gaiman or simply gave
Gaiman some hints or something.

I took a quick look at the first 6 or 7 chapters. I don't see any
obvious correspondence with the letter titles and the order given in
Wikipedia, but 'magician' does seem to align with the fish part of the
plot. Possibly the trumps are a skeleton key to figuring out the
unscrambled order of the letters? I don't remember anyone pointing out
any interesting problems with the ordering and giving a revealing true
ordering.

-- 
gwern
http://www.gwern.net

---

From: Darth Ed <darthed77 at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 07 May 2012 16:49:55 +0000

> Gaiman some hints or something.

I concur. That's my feeling as well.

> any interesting problems with the ordering and giving a revealing true

I don't think the letters/chapters are out of order per se with regards to
some canonical ordering of the Major Arcana and that we need to reorder the
chapters/letters to fit that canonical ordering. In a Tarot reading, the
cards are shuffled and the ordering of the cards is significant to the
person who is being read by the reader. And I don't think the titles are
necessarily related to the Major Arcana, but rather the principle
characters and/or action that takes place in each letter/chapter can be
matched to each of the Major Arcana. In that respect, I'm keen on David
Stockoff's interpretation which identified several such matches for a
handful of the letters/chapters. He also incorporated the mirroring nicely
into his interpretation. His identifications seemed quite reasonable to me,
and I think further study is warranted and may come up with additional
identifications between the letters/chapters and the Major Arcana. I'll
certainly be looking for such connection on my next reading of TSH, but I
suspect that's probably years from now, unfortunately.

In a sense, we, the readers of the book, are like the Tarot reader who
reads the past, present, and future of a person/character. The
cards/chapters represent the past and the present; the reader interprets
them and uses them to foretell the future of the person/character.

Later,
Ed

---

From: Fred Kiesche <godelescherbach at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 07 May 2012 20:47:30 +0000

hardcover of the "first" edition (SFBC, long story as to why that is the
hardcover). Much of the story revolves around the Tarot; I have not read
this in years and will be putting it on Mount Tobereread.

On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 12:49 PM, Darth Ed <darthed77 at gmail.com> wrote:

> My WolfeWiki profile:
> http://www.wolfewiki.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php?n=Profiles.DarthEd

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From: David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
Date: Mon, 07 May 2012 22:31:01 +0000

I think I know that mountain. Legend says its summit stands unseen above 
the clouds and may be reached by no man or woman.

I'll have to read NOVA; I find the Tarot interesting as the basis for an 
organizational scheme.

On 5/7/2012 4:47 PM, Fred Kiesche wrote:
> Tarot: Read a long time ago was NOVA by Samuel R. Delany. I just got a 
> hardcover of the "first" edition (SFBC, long story as to why that is 
> the hardcover). Much of the story revolves around the Tarot; I have 
> not read this in years and will be putting it on Mount Tobereread.
>
> On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 12:49 PM, Darth Ed <darthed77 at gmail.com 
> <mailto:darthed77 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>     To post, write urth at urth.net <mailto:urth at urth.net>
>     Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net <http://www.urth.net/>
>
>
>
>
> -- 
> being presented with Volume 2 of The Decline and Fall of the Roman 
> Empire.) Blogging at The Lensman's Children 
> (http://theeternalgoldenbraid.blogspot.com/).
>
>
>
>

---

From: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <danldo at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 07 May 2012 23:47:31 +0000

The Tarot is not the organizational schema of NOVA, but it's one of
the things used to produce meaning.

On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 3:31 PM, David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net> wrote:
> I think I know that mountain. Legend says its summit stands unseen above the
> clouds and may be reached by no man or woman.
>
>> ? ?On May 4, 2012, at 11:32 AM, Gwern Branwen wrote:
>> ? ?> The book *is* dedicated effusively to Gaiman by Wolfe; it's not
>> ? ?> unreasonable to think that Wolfe targeted it at Gaiman or simply
>> ? ?gave
>> ? ?> Gaiman some hints or something.
>>
>> ? ?I concur. That's my feeling as well.
>>
>> ? ?> I took a quick look at the first 6 or 7 chapters. I don't see any
>> ? ?> obvious correspondence with the letter titles and the order given in
>> ? ?> Wikipedia, but 'magician' does seem to align with the fish part
>> ? ?of the
>> ? ?> plot. Possibly the trumps are a skeleton key to figuring out the
>> ? ?> unscrambled order of the letters? I don't remember anyone
>> ? ?pointing out
>> ? ?> any interesting problems with the ordering and giving a
>> ? ?revealing true
>> ? ?> ordering.
>>
>> ? ?I don't think the letters/chapters are out of order per se with
>> ? ?regards to
>> ? ?some canonical ordering of the Major Arcana and that we need to
>> ? ?reorder the
>> ? ?chapters/letters to fit that canonical ordering. In a Tarot
>> ? ?reading, the
>> ? ?cards are shuffled and the ordering of the cards is significant to the
>> ? ?person who is being read by the reader. And I don't think the
>> ? ?titles are
>> ? ?necessarily related to the Major Arcana, but rather the principle
>> ? ?characters and/or action that takes place in each letter/chapter
>> ? ?can be
>> ? ?matched to each of the Major Arcana. In that respect, I'm keen on
>> ? ?David
>> ? ?Stockoff's interpretation which identified several such matches for a
>> ? ?handful of the letters/chapters. He also incorporated the
>> ? ?mirroring nicely
>> ? ?into his interpretation. His identifications seemed quite
>> ? ?reasonable to me,
>> ? ?and I think further study is warranted and may come up with additional
>> ? ?identifications between the letters/chapters and the Major Arcana.
>> ? ?I'll
>> ? ?certainly be looking for such connection on my next reading of
>> ? ?TSH, but I
>> ? ?suspect that's probably years from now, unfortunately.
>>
>> ? ?In a sense, we, the readers of the book, are like the Tarot reader who
>> ? ?reads the past, present, and future of a person/character. The
>> ? ?cards/chapters represent the past and the present; the reader
>> ? ?interprets
>> ? ?them and uses them to foretell the future of the person/character.
>>
>> ? ?Later,
>> ? ?Ed
>>
>> ? ?My WolfeWiki profile:
>> ? ?http://www.wolfewiki.com/pmwiki/pmwiki.php?n=Profiles.DarthEd
>> ? ?_______________________________________________
>> ? ?Urth Mailing List
>> ? ?To post, write urth at urth.net <mailto:urth at urth.net>
>> ? ?Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net <http://www.urth.net/>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> F.P. Kiesche III ?"Ah Mr. Gibbon, another damned, fat, square book.
>> Always, scribble, scribble, scribble, eh?" (The Duke of Gloucester, on being
>> Blogging at The Lensman's Children

-- 
Dan'l Danehy-Oakes

---

From: David Duffy <david.duffy at qimr.edu.au>
Date: Tue, 08 May 2012 01:00:09 +0000

> I'll have to read NOVA; I find the Tarot interesting as the basis for an 

You've read Calvino, I take it?

Cheers, David Duffy.

---

From: David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
Date: Tue, 08 May 2012 01:42:35 +0000

Well ferget it then!  ;)

I couldn't find it for the Kindle anyway.

---

From: David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
Date: Tue, 08 May 2012 01:44:50 +0000

Yes, but which one? /Castle of Crossed Destinies/? That's on my list....

On 5/7/2012 9:00 PM, David Duffy wrote:
>> I'll have to read NOVA; I find the Tarot interesting as the basis for 
>> an organizational scheme.
>

---

From: David Stockhoff <dstockhoff at verizon.net>
Date: Tue, 08 May 2012 05:32:07 +0000

> them and uses them to foretell the future of the person/character.

In addition, since the novel is epistolary, IIRC the letters cross 
overtly at least once (a standard trick) and maybe less obviously at 
other times. So there is already a chance of "shuffling," which not only 
blows up the idea of an ordered, predictable series but points to the 
shuffling of identities and perhaps memories as well. Pick a card, any card.

---

From: Andreas Muegge <dread.dragon at googlemail.com>
Date: Thu, 10 May 2012 14:49:35 +0000

What made me wonder a bit: we know that Gene Wolfe is a master at hiding
things in the text. Why has he made it so obvious that Bax has taken over
the identity of his brother? Is he luring us on a wrong track so that we
stop looking deeper?

-Andreas
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