{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/6562", "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": 6562, "subject": "Short Story 66: Three Fingers", "messages": 16, "voices": 10, "first": "2014-06-10T03:28:01+00:00", "last": "2014-06-27T01:30:39+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Marc Aramini", "address": "marcaramini at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-10T03:28:01+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 66: Three Fingers", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "THREE FINGERS\n\n\n “Three Fingers” was first published in New Constellations in 1976 and is\nincluded in T*he Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories and Other\nStories.*\n\n\n SUMMARY:\n\n\n Michael Moss attempts to push Disney trinkets for a dime to a chubby boy\nreaching through a school fence, then considers going to 44th street in his\nsize S pea jacket to try to sell his wares. He notes no black “Mickey\nMafia” cars following him, then hides from an approaching hearse. A stocky\nwomen named June gives him a ride to the store, and he tries to sell her\ninscribed Disney photos and celluloid figures. Most of his goods are\nforged. The store is closed but he gets a ride back near his house on a\nTriumph Bike from a couple named Harley and Amaryllis.\n\n\n He goes to eat at White Castle when he sees that the man at the counter\nhas beagle puppy ears rather than human ears, so he goes to the soda\nfountain across the street to watch him.\n\n\n When he returns to his house he questions the “woman who [runs] the place”\nabout callers, and in his equipment filled room, once he puts on his home\nmade Mickey Mouse cap, he is accosted by Captain Hook, the Big Bad Wolf,\nand the Wicked Queen. When he encourages them to take off their masks after\naccusing them of being conglomerations of historical and mythical figures,\nthey are revealed to be paunchy businesspeople in suits. They attempt to\nforce candy in his mouth and nostrils, a suffocation through a surfeit of\nsweetness. Most of the disjunction here occurs through the final line, when\nit is revealed that someone is trying to force antipsychotic medication\ndown his throat with four/three fingers encased in white/red gloves.\n\n\n THEME:\n\n\n Here, Wolfe is playing with a few wonderful ideas — the obvious ones that\nthe Disney villains are far more historical and archetypal than their\nactual surface identity — Captain Hook is every dark captain in history,\nthe Big Bad Wolf a remnant of a line of sinister far more bestial predators\ngoing back to the wolf Isengrim, nemesis of Reynard the fox. To Michael\nMoss, the horror of these characters looms behind their sanitized, cartoon\nfaces. Yet in reality, the corporate world has stripped them of their\nmythic and historical power and turned them into the means of making a\nlarge profit (ironically, something he is trying to do to them on a much\nsmaller scale) — thus, underneath the masks descended from legend we see\nonly corporate abuse — and historical symbols being trademarked as watered\ndown (or sweetened up) narrative property.\n\n\n DIAMONDS:\n\n\n Diamonds keep occurring as a description whenever someone reaches out to\nbuy Michael's goods in the story: “The little boy stretched out a hand,\nthrusting his chubby arm though the diamond mesh of the playground fence” —\nLater, when Michael tries to sell the figures in his cigar box to June, she\nreaches out “plump, diamonded fingers.” It seems that everyone who reaches\nout for his wares is associated with diamonds, though of course the first\nis merely the shape of the fence. Michael's hands fidget to hide the hole\nin his jeans. The final image of the story involves a hand forcing medicine\ndown his throat — certainly the medicine is also a poison as advertised for\ndestroying the interesting fantasy world Michael inhibits.\n\n\n AMBIGUOUS DETAILS:\n\n\n The overall message that companies like Disney to some degree represent\nthe cut throat consumer nature of profiting off old legends and\ntrademarking them in such a way that ideas which should be intrinsically\nfree are “owned” by unimaginative businessmen does not of course explain\nthe descent into insanity in the last several seconds (nor the disjunction\nbetween four/three fingers - but I would like to think that we are counting\nfingers and not thumbs, and that those administering the para-reserpine to\nMichael are being viewed through his disjunctive double vision.)\n\n\n Michael Moss is obsessed with Disney and its characters as well, and\nperhaps embodies the earlier ideology of Mickey Mouse and Disney before\nconsumerism and business sense created the “surfeit of sweetness” and\nbanality any sanitized vision of archetypes will create. He does seem to\nregret inflation and his prices are so cheap that it harkens back to the\npre-inflation prices extent at the start of the 20th century.\n\nIt seems that Michael is trying to make a profit on the Disney images\njust as much as the corporation is, albeit at a microscopic scale — he\nrelishes the attention he gets from them as something that makes him\n“important”, but he sees the mythic importance of all the characters,\nand even tries to assume the role of Mickey Mouse by putting on the\nhat to confront the villains, though he does not prove up to the task.\n\n\n DATE:\n\n\n The story is set at a date sufficiently distanced from 1935 such that a\nstout woman in a mink coat with two sons at Antioch college (ie — not\nyoung) can speculate, “I didn't know they had plastic way back then,”\nunaware of celluloid. This might be a 1976 kind of statement, though the\nprices at which Michael is attempting to sell his goods seems ridiculously\ncheap to modern eyes, and might even be set well past 1976. At 10 to 85\ncents, even with modern inflation, assuming this was the seventies, he is\nasking for the modern equivalent of perhaps 60 cents to maybe 6 dollars for\nsomething that is over 40 years old in mint condition (even though he\nmanufactures them in his room — everything seems counterfeit in this\nparticular story).\n\n\n THE RESIDENCE OF MOSS:\n\n\n There is some hint that his “apartment” is a bit more like a hospital ward\nthan a living quarter:\n\n\n ?The woman who ran the place where he lived said, 'Did you have a nice\nwalk, Mr. Moss?' ...\n\n'You wouldn't let them in if they came, would you? I mean even if they knew\nmy name and said they were friends of mine. You wouldn't let them into my\nroom?' The woman smiled, smoothing her white dress with her hands, wanting\nto be busy again.\n\n\n Her white dress, wanting to be busy, and her responsibility for refusing\nto admit people to the room all at least echo a medical set up. (Note that\nshe also fidgets with her hands here — they come up quite a bit in this\nstory).\n\n\n He supposedly has a Dremo Moto-Tool to create his miniatures and an\ninjection molding machine filling his room. He puts on his felt cap with\nMickey ears made from his father's skull cap to work, and at this point,\nwhen he puts on the home made guise of Mickey Mouse, the villains come out.\n\n\n LITERARY AND CULTURAL ALLUSIONS:\n\n\n Besides Disney references, we have at least one other to contemporary\nfiction:\n\n“He thumbed for nearly an hour before a married couple named Harley and\nAmaryllis gave him a ride back on their Triumph bike” refers to Richard\nHall's 1969 story “To Sport with Amaryllis” in which a square fellow named\nHarley concedes to his wife Amaryllis' free love and progressive desires.\nIt was also published in the Orbit anthologies of Damon Knight.\n\n\n The title of that story comes from Milton's poem Lycidas, a lament for a\ndrowned friend, which begins:\n\n\n Yet once more, O ye Laurels, and once more\n\nYe Myrtles brown, with Ivy never-sear\n\nI com to pluck your Berries harsh and crude,\n\nAnd with forc'd fingers rude,\n\nShatter your leaves before the mellowing year.\n\nBitter constraint and said occasion dear,\n\nCompels me to disturb your season due:\n\nFor Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime\n\n\n\nAlas! What boots it with uncessant care\n\nTo tend the homely slighted Shepherds trade,\n\nAnd strictly meditate the thankles Muse,\n\nWere it not better don as others use,\n\nto sport with Amaryllis in the shade,\n\nOr with the tangles of Neaera's hair?\n\nFame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise\n\n(That last infirmity of Noble mind)\n\nTo scorn delights and live laborious dayes\n\n\n Interesting in light of its forceful fingers in the opening stanza, and\nthe concept that we do not just take it easy and enjoy life when goaded on\nby something else that might cost us.\n\n\n THE PARARESERPINE\n\n\n Reserpine was once used in the treatment of schizophrenia and\nhypertension, isolated from Rauwolfia Serpentina, the Indian snakeroot,\nwhich had been used to treat insanity, fever, and snake bite for centuries\nin India. One of its side effects can be nightmares and Parkinsonism (could\nthis be the flitting of his hands interrupting his gestures as seen in the\ncar scene with June?)\n\n Para as a prefix could mean many things, including alongside, near, or\nsynthesized. The idea that all of this is a psychotically induced\nhallucination is certainly possible, especially in the fictional light of\nHarley and Amaryllis and the businessmen in Disney disguises which resonate\nwith legendary villains and archetypes. The name Michael Moss makes him a\nmore rat like survivor trying to make a profit — in this case a scavenger\ninspired by the increasingly sanitized Mickey Mouse.\n\n\n THE DISNEY FIGURES:\n\n\n Mickey Mouse Club photos for sale include Tommy Kirk and Annette\nFunicello, and he tries to foist Pinocchio, Geppetto, Stromboli, and Snow\nWhite collectibles on people. He forges their signatures on a counter top\nand decorates the heart joining their names shield like with Ben Ali Gator\nand Hyacinth Hippo (dancers from Fantasia) and a beribboned sailor cap for\na crest (I'm pretty sure that's Donald Duck's hat).\n\n\n He identifies Hook with pirates like Blackbeard and Barbarosa and Bligh,\nthe Big Bad Wolf as “the wolf of old europe, the wolf that tore the\nsentries to bits in front of the winter palace at St. Petersburg. The wolf\nthat was killed by the invention of firearms like the great god Pan by the\ncoming of Christ. The wolf people now say never existed, and forget all the\nstories. You are Baron Isengrim.” (He is referring here to the serf's\nrebellion and roaming wolves after the death of Peter the Great in 1725 —\nsocial upheaval and collapse, the failure of civilization to predation).\n\n\n The Wicked Queen becomes powerful and cruel women in power like Lucrezia\nBorgia and Catherine De Medici and even Morgan le Fay, while our thin\nscavenger selling forged goods puts on his cap and tries to assume the role\nof Mickey Mouse.\n\nIS THERE A FINGER CHOMP?\n\nThe motions of hands throughout are interesting, including the chubby\nchild's hand reaching through the diamond meshed fence, the chubby\nberinged hand of the woman June reaching for the Snow White replica, and\nMichael's own: “All his gestures were interrupted by the desertions of his\nleft hand, which made quick trips to draw the torn cloth [leaving his knee\nexposed] together again.” I have always thought that Moss acts to bite off\nthe finger of the villainous toon/executive, who has both real and mythic\nidentities, thus making the glove both white and red with blood, and\naccounting for the different number of fingers, though the casual nature\nthat it strokes his face does not seem to support this reading:\n\n“He tried to swallow it before she could get in another, and found that it\nhad become a red jelly bean too, and went down easily. 'What is it?' said\nthe man who had been Captain Hook. 'Synthetic para-reserpine,' said the\nwoman. 'I've had good luck with it on him.' She touched Michael's face with\na white/red rubber-gloved hand that had four/three fingers.”\n\n Of course, we also have the odd fact that Mickey Mouse and his crew only\nseem to have three fingers and one thumb, and this might simply show the\ntransition from his interesting fantasy world of three fingered Disney to\nbanal reality — but note that the RED rubber glove has three fingers, and\nnot, as is typical in Disney, the white one. For this reason, I think the\nfinal moment constitutes a pretty severe chomp, and that one way or another\nMichael Moss doesn't live in reality, though his version of things might be\nmore interesting. Indeed, his violence might be able to make at least one\nfeature of the real world conform to the three fingered schematics of his\nfantasy. If he is in a hospital all along, then these paunchy businessmen\nassume one more identity: the nurses and caregivers “tormenting” him after\nhis walk.\n\nRESONANCE WITH OTHER WORKS: I feel that what Wolfe is doing thematically\nhere, taking pop culture, and identifying its mythic roots while at the\nsame time making it all too ordinary, is exactly the kind of thing that\nhappened in “Thag”, where Henry Nailer, an ordinary father, is somehow\ntranslated into a mythic fairy story and an ordinary man “becomes” Odin.\nHere, in the imagination of a young boy, these corporate types become\nfigures of legendary villainy behind defanged children's masks." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-10T03:50:47+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 66: Three Fingers", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "\"Three Fingers\" remains one of my favorite Wolfe stories. I am, myself, an\nimmense Disney fan/freak who has gone so far as to spend the money to eat\nat Club 33 just so I could say I had.\n\nBut Wolfe is right, the Disney corporation's protection of its\ntrademarks/copyrights is downright paranoia-inducing.\n\nThere was a daycare in Florida that decorated with hand-painted images of\nDisney characters. Unfortunately, it was on the outside of the building,\nand when a Disney suit happened to pass by, they received a letter ordering\nthem not only to cease and desist, but to repaint immediately, which, if\nyou know anything about the economics of daycares, was tantamount to\nbankrupting them.\n\n(There's a happy ending. Someone at Warner heard about it, and WB paid to\nhave the place repainted in Warner Bros. characters.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Jun 9, 2014 at 8:28 PM, Marc Aramini wrote:\nTHREE FINGERS\n\n\n “Three Fingers” was first published in New Constellations in 1976 and is\nincluded in T*he Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories and Other\nStories.*\n\n\n SUMMARY:\n\n\n Michael Moss attempts to push Disney trinkets for a dime to a chubby boy\nreaching through a school fence, then considers going to 44th street in\nhis size S pea jacket to try to sell his wares. He notes no black “Mickey\nMafia” cars following him, then hides from an approaching hearse. A stocky\nwomen named June gives him a ride to the store, and he tries to sell her\ninscribed Disney photos and celluloid figures. Most of his goods are\nforged. The store is closed but he gets a ride back near his house on a\nTriumph Bike from a couple named Harley and Amaryllis.\n\n\n He goes to eat at White Castle when he sees that the man at the counter\nhas beagle puppy ears rather than human ears, so he goes to the soda\nfountain across the street to watch him.\n\n\n When he returns to his house he questions the “woman who [runs] the\nplace” about callers, and in his equipment filled room, once he puts on his\nhome made Mickey Mouse cap, he is accosted by Captain Hook, the Big Bad\nWolf, and the Wicked Queen. When he encourages them to take off their masks\nafter accusing them of being conglomerations of historical and mythical\nfigures, they are revealed to be paunchy businesspeople in suits. They\nattempt to force candy in his mouth and nostrils, a suffocation through a\nsurfeit of sweetness. Most of the disjunction here occurs through the final\nline, when it is revealed that someone is trying to force antipsychotic\nmedication down his throat with four/three fingers encased in white/red\ngloves.\n\n\n THEME:\n\n\n Here, Wolfe is playing with a few wonderful ideas — the obvious ones\nthat the Disney villains are far more historical and archetypal than their\nactual surface identity — Captain Hook is every dark captain in history,\nthe Big Bad Wolf a remnant of a line of sinister far more bestial predators\ngoing back to the wolf Isengrim, nemesis of Reynard the fox. To Michael\nMoss, the horror of these characters looms behind their sanitized, cartoon\nfaces. Yet in reality, the corporate world has stripped them of their\nmythic and historical power and turned them into the means of making a\nlarge profit (ironically, something he is trying to do to them on a much\nsmaller scale) — thus, underneath the masks descended from legend we see\nonly corporate abuse — and historical symbols being trademarked as watered\ndown (or sweetened up) narrative property.\n\n\n DIAMONDS:\n\n\n Diamonds keep occurring as a description whenever someone reaches out to\nbuy Michael's goods in the story: “The little boy stretched out a hand,\nthrusting his chubby arm though the diamond mesh of the playground fence” ?\nLater, when Michael tries to sell the figures in his cigar box to June, she\nreaches out “plump, diamonded fingers.” It seems that everyone who reaches\nout for his wares is associated with diamonds, though of course the first\nis merely the shape of the fence. Michael's hands fidget to hide the hole\nin his jeans. The final image of the story involves a hand forcing medicine\ndown his throat — certainly the medicine is also a poison as advertised for\ndestroying the interesting fantasy world Michael inhibits.\n\n\n AMBIGUOUS DETAILS:\n\n\n The overall message that companies like Disney to some degree represent\nthe cut throat consumer nature of profiting off old legends and\ntrademarking them in such a way that ideas which should be intrinsically\nfree are “owned” by unimaginative businessmen does not of course explain\nthe descent into insanity in the last several seconds (nor the disjunction\nbetween four/three fingers - but I would like to think that we are counting\nfingers and not thumbs, and that those administering the para-reserpine to\nMichael are being viewed through his disjunctive double vision.)\n\n\n Michael Moss is obsessed with Disney and its characters as well, and\nperhaps embodies the earlier ideology of Mickey Mouse and Disney before\nconsumerism and business sense created the “surfeit of sweetness” and\nbanality any sanitized vision of archetypes will create. He does seem to\nregret inflation and his prices are so cheap that it harkens back to the\npre-inflation prices extent at the start of the 20th century.\n\nIt seems that Michael is trying to make a profit on the Disney images just as much as the corporation is, albeit at a microscopic scale — he relishes the attention he gets from them as something that makes him “important”, but he sees the mythic importance of all the characters, and even tries to assume the role of Mickey Mouse by putting on the hat to confront the villains, though he does not prove up to the task.\n\n\n DATE:\n\n\n The story is set at a date sufficiently distanced from 1935 such that a\nstout woman in a mink coat with two sons at Antioch college (ie — not\nyoung) can speculate, “I didn't know they had plastic way back then,”\nunaware of celluloid. This might be a 1976 kind of statement, though the\nprices at which Michael is attempting to sell his goods seems ridiculously\ncheap to modern eyes, and might even be set well past 1976. At 10 to 85\ncents, even with modern inflation, assuming this was the seventies, he is\nasking for the modern equivalent of perhaps 60 cents to maybe 6 dollars for\nsomething that is over 40 years old in mint condition (even though he\nmanufactures them in his room — everything seems counterfeit in this\nparticular story).\n\n\n THE RESIDENCE OF MOSS:\n\n\n There is some hint that his “apartment” is a bit more like a hospital\nward than a living quarter:\n\n\n “The woman who ran the place where he lived said, 'Did you have a nice\nwalk, Mr. Moss?' ...\n\n'You wouldn't let them in if they came, would you” I mean even if they\nknew my name and said they were friends of mine. You wouldn't let them into\nmy room?' The woman smiled, smoothing her white dress with her hands,\nwanting to be busy again.\n\n\n Her white dress, wanting to be busy, and her responsibility for refusing\nto admit people to the room all at least echo a medical set up. (Note that\nshe also fidgets with her hands here — they come up quite a bit in this\nstory).\n\n\n He supposedly has a Dremo Moto-Tool to create his miniatures and an\ninjection molding machine filling his room. He puts on his felt cap with\nMickey ears made from his father's skull cap to work, and at this point,\nwhen he puts on the home made guise of Mickey Mouse, the villains come out.\n\n\n LITERARY AND CULTURAL ALLUSIONS:\n\n\n Besides Disney references, we have at least one other to contemporary\nfiction:\n\n“He thumbed for nearly an hour before a married couple named Harley and\nAmaryllis gave him a ride back on their Triumph bike” refers to Richard\nHall's 1969 story “To Sport with Amaryllis” in which a square fellow named\nHarley concedes to his wife Amaryllis' free love and progressive desires.\nIt was also published in the Orbit anthologies of Damon Knight.\n\n\n The title of that story comes from Milton's poem Lycidas, a lament for a\ndrowned friend, which begins:\n\n\n Yet once more, O ye Laurels, and once more\n\nYe Myrtles brown, with Ivy never-sear\n\nI com to pluck your Berries harsh and crude,\n\nAnd with forc'd fingers rude,\n\nShatter your leaves before the mellowing year.\n\nBitter constraint and said occasion dear,\n\nCompels me to disturb your season due:\n\nFor Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime\n\n\n\nAlas! What boots it with uncessant care\n\nTo tend the homely slighted Shepherds trade,\n\nAnd strictly meditate the thankles Muse,\n\nWere it not better don as others use,\n\nto sport with Amaryllis in the shade,\n\nOr with the tangles of Neaera's hair?\n\nFame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise\n\n(That last infirmity of Noble mind)\n\nTo scorn delights and live laborious dayes\n\n\n Interesting in light of its forceful fingers in the opening stanza, and\nthe concept that we do not just take it easy and enjoy life when goaded on\nby something else that might cost us.\n\n\n THE PARARESERPINE\n\n\n Reserpine was once used in the treatment of schizophrenia and\nhypertension, isolated from Rauwolfia Serpentina, the Indian snakeroot,\nwhich had been used to treat insanity, fever, and snake bite for centuries\nin India. One of its side effects can be nightmares and Parkinsonism (could\nthis be the flitting of his hands interrupting his gestures as seen in the\ncar scene with June?)\n\n Para as a prefix could mean many things, including alongside, near, or\nsynthesized. The idea that all of this is a psychotically induced\nhallucination is certainly possible, especially in the fictional light of\nHarley and Amaryllis and the businessmen in Disney disguises which resonate\nwith legendary villains and archetypes. The name Michael Moss makes him a\nmore rat like survivor trying to make a profit — in this case a scavenger\ninspired by the increasingly sanitized Mickey Mouse.\n\n\n THE DISNEY FIGURES:\n\n\n Mickey Mouse Club photos for sale include Tommy Kirk and Annette\nFunicello, and he tries to foist Pinocchio, Geppetto, Stromboli, and Snow\nWhite collectibles on people. He forges their signatures on a counter top\nand decorates the heart joining their names shield like with Ben Ali Gator\nand Hyacinth Hippo (dancers from Fantasia) and a beribboned sailor cap for\na crest (I'm pretty sure that's Donald Duck's hat).\n\n\n He identifies Hook with pirates like Blackbeard and Barbarosa and Bligh,\nthe Big Bad Wolf as “the wolf of old europe, the wolf that tore the\nsentries to bits in front of the winter palace at St. Petersburg. The wolf\nthat was killed by the invention of firearms like the great god Pan by the\ncoming of Christ. The wolf people now say never existed, and forget all the\nstories. You are Baron Isengrim.” (He is referring here to the serf's\nrebellion and roaming wolves after the death of Peter the Great in 1725 ?\nsocial upheaval and collapse, the failure of civilization to predation).\n\n\n The Wicked Queen becomes powerful and cruel women in power like Lucrezia\nBorgia and Catherine De Medici and even Morgan le Fay, while our thin\nscavenger selling forged goods puts on his cap and tries to assume the role\nof Mickey Mouse.\n\nIS THERE A FINGER CHOMP?\n\nThe motions of hands throughout are interesting, including the chubby\nchild's hand reaching through the diamond meshed fence, the chubby\nberinged hand of the woman June reaching for the Snow White replica, and\nMichael's own: “All his gestures were interrupted by the desertions of his\nleft hand, which made quick trips to draw the torn cloth [leaving his knee\nexposed] together again.” I have always thought that Moss acts to bite\noff the finger of the villainous toon/executive, who has both real and\nmythic identities, thus making the glove both white and red with blood, and\naccounting for the different number of fingers, though the casual nature\nthat it strokes his face does not seem to support this reading:\n\n“He tried to swallow it before she could get in another, and found that\nit had become a red jelly bean too, and went down easily. 'What is it?'\nsaid the man who had been Captain Hook. 'Synthetic para-reserpine,' said\nthe woman. 'I've had good luck with it on him.' She touched Michael's face\nwith a white/red rubber-gloved hand that had four/three fingers.”\n\n Of course, we also have the odd fact that Mickey Mouse and his crew\nonly seem to have three fingers and one thumb, and this might simply show\nthe transition from his interesting fantasy world of three fingered Disney\nto banal reality — but note that the RED rubber glove has three fingers,\nand not, as is typical in Disney, the white one. For this reason, I think\nthe final moment constitutes a pretty severe chomp, and that one way or\nanother Michael Moss doesn't live in reality, though his version of things\nmight be more interesting. Indeed, his violence might be able to make at\nleast one feature of the real world conform to the three fingered\nschematics of his fantasy. If he is in a hospital all along, then these\npaunchy businessmen assume one more identity: the nurses and caregivers\n“tormenting” him after his walk.\n\nRESONANCE WITH OTHER WORKS: I feel that what Wolfe is doing thematically\nhere, taking pop culture, and identifying its mythic roots while at the\nsame time making it all too ordinary, is exactly the kind of thing that\nhappened in “Thag”, where Henry Nailer, an ordinary father, is somehow\ntranslated into a mythic fairy story and an ordinary man “becomes” Odin.\nHere, in the imagination of a young boy, these corporate types become\nfigures of legendary villainy behind defanged children's masks.\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<5396FD25.2090809@bindweed.com>", "from": { "name": "Gerry Quinn", "address": "gerry at bindweed.com" }, "date": "2014-06-10T12:42:13+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 66: Three Fingers", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On 10/06/2014 04:50, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\nBut Wolfe is right, the Disney corporation's protection of its \ntrademarks/copyrights is downright paranoia-inducing.\n\nThere was a daycare in Florida that decorated with hand-painted images \nof Disney characters. Unfortunately, it was on the outside of the \nbuilding, and when a Disney suit happened to pass by, they received a \nletter ordering them not only to cease and desist, but to repaint \nimmediately, which, if you know anything about the economics of \ndaycares, was tantamount to bankrupting them.\n\n(There's a happy ending. Someone at Warner heard about it, and WB paid \nto have the place repainted in Warner Bros. characters.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That said, it wasn't just one daycare centre, it was several in the same \ncity. That may have struck Disney lawyers as more dangerous than a \nsingle centre...\n\n- Gerry Quinn" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Marc Aramini", "address": "marcaramini at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-10T16:29:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 66: Three Fingers", "in_reply_to": "<5396FD25.2090809@bindweed.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "So do you guys think he bites a finger off at the end? The yellow bonbon\nbecomes a red jelly bean in his mouth, the glove is white/red. Do we not\ncount thumbs as fingers? Any other possible meaning to the title?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, Jun 10, 2014 at 5:42 AM, Gerry Quinn wrote:\n\nOn 10/06/2014 04:50, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "But Wolfe is right, the Disney corporation's protection of its\ntrademarks/copyrights is downright paranoia-inducing.\n\nThere was a daycare in Florida that decorated with hand-painted images of\nDisney characters. Unfortunately, it was on the outside of the building,\nand when a Disney suit happened to pass by, they received a letter ordering\nthem not only to cease and desist, but to repaint immediately, which, if\nyou know anything about the economics of daycares, was tantamount to\nbankrupting them.\n\n(There's a happy ending. Someone at Warner heard about it, and WB paid to\nhave the place repainted in Warner Bros. characters.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "That said, it wasn't just one daycare centre, it was several in the same\ncity. That may have struck Disney lawyers as more dangerous than a single\ncentre...\n\n- Gerry Quinn\n\n\n\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Marc Aramini", "address": "marcaramini at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-10T16:34:59+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 66: Three Fingers", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "As far as I can tell, the Wicked Queen of Snow White, Grimeheld, has five\ndigits on each hand and doesn't wear gloves, and is distinct from the\nvillain of Sleeping Beauty, Maleficent. (Though I suspect this story would\nnot deign to separate them symbolically)" } ] }, { "message_id": "<1402603727.72629.YahooMailNeo@web142601.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2014-06-12T20:08:47+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I just read Michael Swanwick's _Stations of the Tides_, which I've read was intentionally inspired by Fifth Head's style.\n\n\nAre there other known/acknowledged pieces as closely mirroring Wolfe? (Let's leave out the obvious _Shadows of the New Sun_...)\n\nEvery time I ask questions like this, I feel like I'm forgetting something obvious.\n\nCraig" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "David Duffy", "address": "david.duffy at qimr.edu.au" }, "date": "2014-06-13T00:47:42+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "<1402603727.72629.YahooMailNeo@web142601.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Fri, 13 Jun 2014, Craig Brewer wrote:\nI just read Michael Swanwick's _Stations of the Tides_, which I've read \nwas intentionally inspired by Fifth Head's style.\n\nAre there other known/acknowledged pieces as closely mirroring Wolfe? \n(Let's leave out the obvious _Shadows of the New Sun_...)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Writing style? Plotting? Ambience?\n\nInfluenced by:\n\nPaul McAuley (Confluence trilogy)\nPaul Park (Starbridge Chronicles)\n\nAnd someone else has made a list:\n\nhttp://www.freebase.com/user/jfry/default_domain/views/authors_influenced_by_gene_wolfe\n\n\nCheers, David Duffy." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andrew Mason", "address": "andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-14T20:45:10+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Neal Stephenson's _Anathem_ is reminiscent of _New Sun_ in a number of\nways, so much so that once, having momentarily forgotten the name of its\nhero, I found myself calling him 'Severian'. It may be that Stephenson is\nacknowledging this influence in naming a language (not a planet, as some\nhave claimed) 'Orth'." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Thayer", "address": "michael.o.thayer at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-15T02:10:14+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Andrew Mason> Neal Stephenson's _Anathem_ is reminiscent of _New Sun_ in\na number of\nways, so much so that once, having momentarily forgotten the name of its\nhero, I found myself calling him 'Severian'. It may be that Stephenson is\nacknowledging this influence in naming a language (not a planet, as some\nhave claimed) 'Orth'.\n_____________\n\nI am a big fan of Anathem, but I just don't see the New Sun\nparallels/connection -- what specifically do you see as the similarities?\n I'm intrigued." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Marc Aramini", "address": "marcaramini at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-15T16:27:14+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Sat, Jun 14, 2014 at 7:10 PM, Michael Thayer \nwrote:\nAndrew Mason> Neal Stephenson's _Anathem_ is reminiscent of _New Sun_\nin a number of\nways, so much so that once, having momentarily forgotten the name of its\nhero, I found myself calling him 'Severian'. It may be that Stephenson is\nacknowledging this influence in naming a language (not a planet, as some\nhave claimed) 'Orth'.\n_____________\n\nI am a big fan of Anathem, but I just don't see the New Sun\nparallels/connection -- what specifically do you see as the similarities?\n I'm intrigued.\n\n_______________________________________________\nUrth Mailing List\nTo post, write urth at urth.net\nSubscription/information: http://www.urth.net" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Anathem is my least favorite of Stephenson's by a good stretch. I found the\nmetaphysical implications of New Sun far more personally compelling than\nthe \"history of philosophy\" execution in Anathem, perhaps because the\nnuminous and spiritual was approached from a different contextual\nstandpoint.\n\nPerhaps the big difference between Wolfe and other authors resides in the\nfact that he is practically trained as an engineer, respects both pulp and\nclassic literature, and still believes in the spiritual and mystical world\nin a way that many other modern, intelligent writers do not. Thus works\nobviously inspired by him like Confluence seem extremely secular and\n\"nonmysterious\" in comparison when the veneer of plot is stripped away or\nas the story develops, leaving worldly themes that close off and exhaust\nmysterious possibilities rather than embrace them.\nFantasy is just a genre to play with to authors like John Crowley and even\nperhaps M John Harrison, and I think Crowley's Aegypt sequence shows that\ntriumph of boring realism in its progression to a very unsatisfying\nconclusion (a tone clearly in tune with the dominant literary zeitgeist of\nthe 20th and 21st century, unlike some of Wolfe's efforts). Extremely\nreligious works usually wind up being unintellectual propaganda, and Wolfe,\nin my opinion, avoids this, too. (Of course I am assuming we are not\ntalking about escapism and fluff like, say, superhero movies as a dominant\nmovement in \"literature\" until fairly recently, though it is certainly\nalive in the culture right now)." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andrew Mason", "address": "andrew.mason53 at googlemail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-17T21:05:38+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Michael Thayer wrote:\n\nI am a big fan of Anathem, but I just don't see the New Sun\nparallels/connection -- what specifically do you see as the similarities?\n I'm intrigued." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Set on an Earth-like planet in the far 'future' (though not as far, nor as\nblatantly Earth-like)\n\nLots of unusual words (in Wolfe real words: in Stephenson made-up ones,\nthough not too mysterious if you know Latin; but the effect is similar).\n\nThe hero begins in an enclosed community and then goes on a journey.\n\nAnd, most importantly, the idea of alternative worlds and a choice between\nthem.\n\nWell, it may not add up to much, but Stephenson was rather absurdly accused\nof plagiarism (with the mistaken claim that the planet is called Orth), so\nclearly others besides me have noticed a similarity.\n\nAs I mentioned a little while ago, Paul Witcover's _The Emperor of All\nThings_ seems to acknowledge a debt to Wolfe, though perhaps a negative\none, as the character Wolfe is a villain; (but then, Umberto Eco made\nBorges a villain, and I don't think that was meant in a wholly hostile\nway)." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": ">" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Antonin Scriabin", "address": "kierkegaurdian at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-17T21:17:01+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Anathem didn't do it for me, but I agree that the New Sun plagiarism\ncharges are silly." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Jun 17, 2014 5:05 PM, \"Andrew Mason\" \nwrote:\nMichael Thayer wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I am a big fan of Anathem, but I just don't see the New Sun\nparallels/connection -- what specifically do you see as the similarities?\n I'm intrigued." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Set on an Earth-like planet in the far 'future' (though not as far, nor as\nblatantly Earth-like)\n\nLots of unusual words (in Wolfe real words: in Stephenson made-up ones,\nthough not too mysterious if you know Latin; but the effect is similar).\n\nThe hero begins in an enclosed community and then goes on a journey.\n\nAnd, most importantly, the idea of alternative worlds and a choice between\nthem.\n\nWell, it may not add up to much, but Stephenson was rather absurdly\naccused of plagiarism (with the mistaken claim that the planet is called\nOrth), so clearly others besides me have noticed a similarity.\n\nAs I mentioned a little while ago, Paul Witcover's _The Emperor of All\nThings_ seems to acknowledge a debt to Wolfe, though perhaps a negative\none, as the character Wolfe is a villain; (but then, Umberto Eco made\nBorges a villain, and I don't think that was meant in a wholly hostile\nway).\n\n\n--" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "dunnaaa .", "address": "bahamut0 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-21T01:01:23+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The world-building is very similar - we are aware that there is a lot going\non out there, but we are only teased brief details which let us attempt to\nconstruct the larger picture.\n\nI definitely got a BotNS vibe off of Anathem - mostly for this reason. I\nthink the difference lies in the explanations that we are given by the\nauthors - for instance, I would have been perfectly happy reading the first\nhalf of Anathem and then leaving it be, with all my questions unanswered,\nbut the possibilities I could create still out there. Whereas with Wolfe, I\nam much happier with the world and the answers that he provides.\n\nSo I guess I'm saying that Wolfe is the better writer, but I can definitely\nget that Anathem evokes some of the feelings that I got when reading BotNS.\n\nCheers,\nSean" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Jun 17, 2014 10:05 PM, \"Andrew Mason\" \nwrote:\nMichael Thayer wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I am a big fan of Anathem, but I just don't see the New Sun\nparallels/connection -- what specifically do you see as the similarities?\n I'm intrigued." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Set on an Earth-like planet in the far 'future' (though not as far, nor as\nblatantly Earth-like)\n\nLots of unusual words (in Wolfe real words: in Stephenson made-up ones,\nthough not too mysterious if you know Latin; but the effect is similar).\n\nThe hero begins in an enclosed community and then goes on a journey.\n\nAnd, most importantly, the idea of alternative worlds and a choice between\nthem.\n\nWell, it may not add up to much, but Stephenson was rather absurdly\naccused of plagiarism (with the mistaken claim that the planet is called\nOrth), so clearly others besides me have noticed a similarity.\n\nAs I mentioned a little while ago, Paul Witcover's _The Emperor of All\nThings_ seems to acknowledge a debt to Wolfe, though perhaps a negative\none, as the character Wolfe is a villain; (but then, Umberto Eco made\nBorges a villain, and I don't think that was meant in a wholly hostile\nway).\n\n\n--" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Antonin Scriabin", "address": "kierkegaurdian at gmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-21T03:26:42+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That was one of my main problems with Anathem. Once the main Avout goes out\ninto the world, it isn't all that interesting. Whereas Urth is fascinating,\nalien, and gets more intriguing by the page. Also, I am on my phone and it\nwanted to autocorrect Urth to Utah. Utah is also interesting. Thanks phone." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Jun 20, 2014 9:01 PM, \"dunnaaa .\" wrote:\nThe world-building is very similar - we are aware that there is a lot\ngoing on out there, but we are only teased brief details which let us\nattempt to construct the larger picture.\n\nI definitely got a BotNS vibe off of Anathem - mostly for this reason. I\nthink the difference lies in the explanations that we are given by the\nauthors - for instance, I would have been perfectly happy reading the first\nhalf of Anathem and then leaving it be, with all my questions unanswered,\nbut the possibilities I could create still out there. Whereas with Wolfe, I\nam much happier with the world and the answers that he provides.\n\nSo I guess I'm saying that Wolfe is the better writer, but I can\ndefinitely get that Anathem evokes some of the feelings that I got when\nreading BotNS.\n\nCheers,\nSean\nOn Jun 17, 2014 10:05 PM, \"Andrew Mason\" \nwrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Michael Thayer wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "I am a big fan of Anathem, but I just don't see the New Sun\nparallels/connection -- what specifically do you see as the similarities?\n I'm intrigued." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Set on an Earth-like planet in the far 'future' (though not as far, nor\nas blatantly Earth-like)\n\nLots of unusual words (in Wolfe real words: in Stephenson made-up ones,\nthough not too mysterious if you know Latin; but the effect is similar).\n\nThe hero begins in an enclosed community and then goes on a journey.\n\nAnd, most importantly, the idea of alternative worlds and a choice\nbetween them.\n\nWell, it may not add up to much, but Stephenson was rather absurdly\naccused of plagiarism (with the mistaken claim that the planet is called\nOrth), so clearly others besides me have noticed a similarity.\n\nAs I mentioned a little while ago, Paul Witcover's _The Emperor of All\nThings_ seems to acknowledge a debt to Wolfe, though perhaps a negative\none, as the character Wolfe is a villain; (but then, Umberto Eco made\nBorges a villain, and I don't think that was meant in a wholly hostile\nway).\n\n\n--" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Robert Pirkola", "address": "rpirkola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2014-06-22T19:00:18+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Short Story 66: Three Fingers", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I looked around at some possible suspects for an evil queen with red gloves and three fingers but also came up empty. ?I re-read Snow White and Brier Rose from Grimm's. ?There is no mention of handwear for the Evil Queen in Snow White and Maleficent is nowhere to be found in Brier Rose. ?The Disney cartoon versions of The Evil Queen, Maleficent, and The Queen of Hearts all have four fingers and a thumb and no red gloves. ?I think your belief that the chomp occurred is well founded because of this and makes a lot of sense except for what you have already pointed out: the calm manner in which the woman who is supposed to have just lost a digit is reacting. ?But if the syntactical sequence of the words in the final sentence is read as describing the temporal sequence of events, it could be that the chomp occurs after she casually touches his face and the gloved hand changes from white with four fingers to red with three within the space of the sentence. ?Therefore, the reaction would occur beyond the final word of the story, in the head of the reader. \"Youch! \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<1403832639.22606.YahooMailNeo@web142603.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2014-06-27T01:30:39+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Swanwick and others", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I unintentionally answered my own question. Well, in a sense: I just finished Caitlin Kiernan's _The Drowning Girl_, and (although I have no idea if it was intentionally influenced by Wolfe), it certainly seems to fit. There are two narratives being given us at once from the pov of a single admittedly \"insane\" narrator. And both can't possibly be true (or \"factual,\" as she says), although both are, she insists, true. So \"unrealiable\" narrator, explicit plots that obviously aren't the \"real\" story, werewolves and ghosts that might not be, etc.\n\n\n\n \n\n\nThe world-building is very similar - we are aware that there is a lot going on out there, but we are only teased brief details which let us attempt to construct the larger picture.\nI definitely got a BotNS vibe off of Anathem - mostly for this reason. I think the difference lies in the explanations that we are given by the authors - for instance, I would have been perfectly happy reading the first half of Anathem and then leaving it be, with all my questions unanswered, but the possibilities I could create still out there. Whereas with Wolfe, I am much happier with the world and the answers that he provides. \nSo I guess I'm saying that Wolfe is the better writer, but I can definitely get that Anathem evokes some of the feelings that I got when reading BotNS. \nCheers,\nSean" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Jun 17, 2014 10:05 PM, \"Andrew Mason\" wrote:\n\n\nMichael Thayer wrote: " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I am a big fan of Anathem, but I just don't see the New Sun\nparallels/connection -- what specifically do you see as the similarities?\n?I'm intrigued." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Set on an Earth-like planet in the far 'future' (though not as far, nor as blatantly Earth-like)\n\n\nLots of unusual words (in Wolfe real words: in Stephenson made-up ones, though not too mysterious if you know Latin; but the effect is similar). \n\n\nThe hero begins in an enclosed community and then goes on a journey. \n\n\nAnd, most importantly, the idea of alternative worlds and a choice between them. \n\n\nWell, it may not add up to much, but Stephenson was rather absurdly accused of plagiarism (with the mistaken claim that the planet is called Orth), so clearly others besides me have noticed a similarity. \n\n\nAs I mentioned a little while ago, Paul Witcover's _The Emperor of All Things_ seems to acknowledge a debt to Wolfe, though perhaps a negative one, as the character Wolfe is a villain; (but then, Umberto Eco made Borges a villain, and I don't think that was meant in a wholly hostile way). \n\n\n\n\n--" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "_______________________________________________\nUrth Mailing List\nTo post, write urth at urth.net\nSubscription/information: http://www.urth.net" } ] } ] }