{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/660", "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": 660, "subject": "Cues", "messages": 6, "voices": 5, "first": "1998-05-24T14:56:08+00:00", "last": "1998-07-09T21:33:30+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "adam louis stephanides", "address": "astephan at students.uiuc.edu" }, "date": "1998-05-24T14:56:08+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Cues", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Quite aside from my own contributions, I enjoyed the discussion of\n\"Suzanne Delage.\" It provided some variety from the discussions of a few\nmajor works, especially BOTNS (not that I don't enjoy those); and it\nallowed people to participate who don't have all the details of BOTNS\nmemorized and don't have time to reread it.\n\nIn this spirit, I'd like to see what people think about \"Cues.\" I\ncertainly wouldn't rank it with BOTNS, or even \"Suzanne Delage\"; but it\nwas selected for Wolfe's first collection (by Wolfe?) and I've always\nfound it somewhat puzzling. My current take on it is that the \"bowling\nballs\" are devils, or something of that ilk. The not-so-young man's deal\nis very much like selling his soul. And the \"bowling ball\" is evasive\nabout its origins, lies (about having a sense of humor) and makes a\nFreudian slip about \"goblins\" in the fourth paragraph. But this doesn't\nexplain why the \"bowling balls\" perceive each other as \"a fair young\nworld, mottled by clouds and rich with life.\" And is there any\nsignificance to the fact that in the next-to-last paragraph (the same one\nin which that description occurs) Wolfe begins to refer to the \"bowling\nballs\" as \"he\" rather than \"it\"?\n\nAnyway, that's as far as I've gotten. Anyone have any ideas?\n\n--Adam" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Peter Westlake", "address": "peter at harlequin.co.uk" }, "date": "1998-05-26T09:49:03+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Cues", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 14:56 1998-05-24 -0500, adam louis stephanides wrote:\nIn this spirit, I'd like to see what people think about \"Cues.\" " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I've wondered about \"Cues\" too: on the face of it, it could be a\nstraightforward shaggy dog story, existing just to set up the pun;\nbut there are hints of something more.\n\nThe galaxy-goblin spaceship isn't the only slip: right at the end\nthe ball says \"I bed your pardon\". Unless it's a typo, of course.\nThe \"Coalstack Nebula\" looks like a real joke by the ball, but\nI'm not sure why coalstacks (chimneys) would be funnier than\ncoal sacks!\n\nI wonder whether the balls really do have a sense of humour, or\nwhether we are seeing them through the n-s-y man's perceptions?\nBut the ball does seem to know how to answer the cue at the end.\nThat's two kinds of cue in the story: if the balls were smaller,\nwe might get a third in somehow.\n\nPeter.\n\n\"Doctor, doctor! I keep thinking I'm a billiard ball!\"\n\"I'm sorry, please wait at the end of the ..." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "adam louis stephanides", "address": "astephan at students.uiuc.edu" }, "date": "1998-05-31T15:53:00+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Cues", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Tue, 26 May 1998 Peter Westlake wrote:\nThe galaxy-goblin spaceship isn't the only slip: right at the end\nthe ball says \"I bed your pardon\". Unless it's a typo, of course." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I had assumed it's a typo, as it doesn't seem to make any sense as\nwritten. But I'm not 100% sure." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I wonder whether the balls really do have a sense of humour, or\nwhether we are seeing them through the n-s-y man's perceptions?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "In addition to the joke at the end, the way the bowling ball's denial is\ndescribed strongly implies that it is being evasive.\n\n--Adam" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Robert Borski", "address": "rborski at coredcs.com" }, "date": "1998-07-05T20:42:25+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Cues", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Time now to consider \"Cues,\" possibly Gene Wolfe's most cryptic short work.\nIt's also extremely scatological if I read it right--wicked, wicked Gene is\nplaying a wicked, wicked joke on you, me and anyone else who's attempted\n(and usually failed) to decipher his works--so if you're offended by\npuerile, bathroom-type humor, perhaps you better steer clear of this one. \n\nThe premise of \"Cues,\" of course, is not that hard to grasp. Given an\ninfinitude of clues about everything in the universe, it's necessary to\nscreen out the unimportant data, to winnow the chaff from the grain, if\nwe're ever to make sense of anything. Otherwise, we'll have a skewed\npicture of the universe because our apprehensions are based on the wrong\nclues--another word for which, obviously, is miscues.\n\nMiscues abound in \"Cues,\" which is why everything seems so nonsensical.\nWe're not seeing the \"universe\" properly because we're concentrating on,\nrather than ignoring, the wrong clues. And yet we keep trying to make sense\nof what's happening, which thereby augments our confusion.\n\nThis concept is perhaps best understood in light of the title and its\nmyriad variations throughout the story, the various miscues. The story\nbegins with a \"?\" This is a misapprehension of \"que,\" the Spanish word for\n\"what.\" The \"not-so-young\" man of our story is a coot. The \"children\" who\nwill inherit his \"talent\" and become \"rich and famous\" (i.e., successful),\nbut less so than him, because he is \"established\" earlier, are cooties. The\nbowling ball from Deneb is a cooze (Deneb is Arabic for tail). The girl who\nis beginning to think herself sexy is a cutie. The sports equipment idea\nthe artist gets involves pool cues. \n\nThere's also the misapprehension involved with the \"cosmic dust, galaxies,\nnebulae, stars\" mention--it's the same error that will be made by \"artists\nwho attempt to visualize us as dark sphere's filled with stars.\" The word\nwe believe we're hearing/conceptualizing here is \"firmament,\" but this is\njust as wrong as is our reading of the \"fair blue world, mottled by clouds\nand rich with life,\" i.e., the Earth. GW gives us a better hint of the\nlatter when the bowling bowl asks the not-so-young man, \"What do you call\nthis place?\" and the latter replies \"'Earth,'\" with Earth being in nested\nquote marks. Why is it not simply \"Earth\"? Because the word we've\nmisapprehended as firmament is actually \"fundament\" and the \"passed Earth\"\nis the same as the artist's doodles (i.e., doodoo).\n\nAt the risk of total ridicule, let me now confirm the worse for you: Yes,\nmy friends, \"Clues\" is about a man going to the bathroom, but as seen by\npeople who are totally clueless as to the nature of what he's doing.\nNaughty, naughty Gene is tweaking our sensibilities big time here--perhaps\neven suggesting most of our attempts to intrepret him are full of sh*t. Or\nperhaps that our heads are up our fundaments. (Me being a veritable ostrich\nof the GI tract, mea maxima culpa.)\n\nAs for sf critic John Clute's contention that \"Clues\" is an example of Gene\nWolfe's antic playfulness, and what he calls \"joie d'esprit,\" I think this\nis admirable--especially since the name of \"not-so-young man\" in the\n\"bathroom\" can almost certainly be worked out to be \"John Clute.\" \n\nRobert Borski/scolex (who came to these thoughts Martin Luther style)\n\n " } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "William H. Ansley", "address": "wansley at warwick.net" }, "date": "1998-07-06T01:23:47+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Cues", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Robert Borski wrote:\nTime now to consider \"Cues,\" possibly Gene Wolfe's most cryptic short work.\nIt's also extremely scatological if I read it right..." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "This concept is perhaps best understood in light of the title and its\nmyriad variations throughout the story, the various miscues. The story\nbegins with a \"?\" This is a misapprehension of \"que,\" the Spanish word for\n\"what.\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You know, I used to think this too, but it's not so. The story opens with\n\n \"Cues?\" the young (not really so young any more) man said. \"I'm\n afraid I don't understand.\"\n\nThe first word is the same as the title, so Gene Wolfe playfully collapsed\nit with the title (even though it is used in quoted speech) resulting in\nonly one initial occurrence of the word \"cues.\" Please note the occurence\nof an open double quote in front the title word with no matching close\nquote on the same line and a close quote after the question mark with no\nmatching open quote (on the same line). I'm really surprised you missed\nthis, considering your obsession with quotes. (Of course, I am going by\npage 294 of the Pocket Books paperback edition of _The Island of Doctor\nDeath and Other Stories and Other Stories_. Perhaps the copy you read was\n\"corrected\" by some over-zealous copy editor.)\n\nThis bit of word play may well be in homage to Lewis Carroll, who did\nsomething very similar in _Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found\nThere_. The last few words of chapter 3 seem to be missing, but they are\nthe same as (and collapsed with, portmanteau-style) the title of chapter 4.\n\nI think you may be confused about who is relieving him(it)self here. (I\nknow I'll be relieved when this particular discussion is over with! 8->)\nAlthough you are not completely clear, I think you are saying that the\nnot-so-young man is on the can. (By the way, could you please favor us with\nall the dirt on how you \"almost certainly\" work out that \"the name of\n'not-so-young man' in the 'bathroom' [is] 'John Clute.'\"?)\n\nBut if that's the case, then why is the bowling ball described as being on\nthe throne. (If a chair of massy gold isn't a throne, I'd like to know what\nis!)\n\nWilliam Ansley" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "mary whalen", "address": "marewhalen at yahoo.com" }, "date": "1998-07-09T21:33:30+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Re: Cues", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "This is Sean Whalen (prion).\n\nWilliam Ansley, I'm glad that you reminded me about the part in cues\nwhere the first bowling ball talks about the universe being infinite\nwith your question about the universe not being infinitely bright if\nit is infinitely large and filled with stars. The reason that the\nuniverse is not overwhelmed by heat is that it is NOT infinite. This\nis the currently held scientific belief, and I agree with it. It has\nbeen known for many years. It is based on many different\nobservations, but these aren't important.\n\nAnother possible, but unlikely, reason would be the fact that even if\nthe universe were infinite in size, it has only existed for around 15\nbillion years and the light from all but the closest stars hasn't yet\nreached Earth. Most scientists think this is very unlikely, but I\njust thought I'd include it as an alternative explanation if you want\nit.\n\nThis point also shows that the not-so-young man is not very smart,\nalong with the ones that you mentioned. More importantly, it it one\nof the examples that show that the bowling balls are not above lying. \nThis further undermines its flawed assertation about an infinite\nnumber of cues being available.\n\nprion" } ] } ] }