# Quadrifons and the godling *The Whorl list — 1 messages, 1 voices, 18 Feb 2001* > 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. --- ### Nicholas Gevers *18 Feb 2001, 00:41* I haven't finished RTW yet, but a couple of topical impressions: 1) The physical impossibility of the godling: I saw this as a deliberate breach of SF protocols by GW. The godling is present in the text as a mark of the Outsider's presence there (the godling's message is ultimately the Outsider's), and thus must take the form of a miracle, a suspension of the laws of nature. 2) Quadrifons: interesting that he is listed at the front of RTW as a major character, yet doesn't appear in the text other than as a tessera and part of an abstract discussion. We know from late in OBW that Horn in fact communicated with Quadrifons, who advised him on how to recognise Smoothbone. The authors of the third person sections of RTW have clearly obeyed Quadrifons' general injunction to avoid using his name, and written him out of the text. They are unreliable narrators (or Horn was in OBW). Any thoughts on Wolfe's reasons for this fascinating lacuna? --Nick Gevers. ---