{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/1253", "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": "whorl", "thread": { "id": 1253, "subject": "For Adam and James: Literary Devices, Authorship, and", "messages": 4, "voices": 2, "first": "2001-03-06T09:20:44+00:00", "last": "2001-03-07T23:41:08+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "ddanehy at siebel.com" }, "date": "2001-03-06T09:20:44+00:00", "subject": "(whorl) For Adam and James: Literary Devices, Authorship, and", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Adam done wrote:\nWhat I meant by this comment was not that the children's\nauthorship should not affect our interpretation of RTTW.\nRather, I meant that I don't find it believable that the\nchildren wrote these sections, although I am compelled\nto accept it as \"true\". [1]" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't immediately have a problem with the kids deliberately writing their\nsections of the \"Book of Horn\" in a way that features prominent \nelisions and elusions. The problem arises when I try to figure out \nhow these reveal character: for they seem designed to reveal the \ncharacter of (Pas)silkhorn rather than that of Hoof-Hide-Daisy-Vadsig;\nand that just doesn't make a great deal of sense. And granting their \nmotives to be similiar to those of Horn writing the Book of Silk -- \nto preserve to their whorl the memory of the best man they have ever \nknown -- does not improve matters; it makes them worse. Horn may \nhave excluded things that would have shown Silk as less than the \nparagon Horn wished to portray; what about the children?\n\nMr Wolfe is a writer obsessed with memory but painfully aware of its \ndeceptive nature; one of the first questions to ask about a narrative \nfalsification in a Wolfe narrative is whether it is deliberate or \nunconscious (each reveals character but in very different ways). \n\nI think it's clear that the sections of SHORT by \"the narrator\" \ne[xc]l[u|i]de his Silkishness unconsciously, and that those by the \nchildren do so deliberately, and that the purposes are quite \ndifferent. Further, I think the reasons for \"the narrator\" leaving the \nquestion of his identity out of the narrative (and still sometimes \nputting it in Freudianslipperishly) are luminous-numinous. But -- \nagain -- what about the children?\n\nIn Mr Wolfe's universe, everybody writes like Wolfe. I do not mean \nthat they all write with a monolithic \"Wolfe style\" (though there is \nsome truth to that), but that everyone elides, eludes, conceals (and \nreveals), and makes mistakes in their narratives. What they conceal, \nand what they reveal by their concealing, is, in Mr Wolfe's universe, \na (maybe _the_) indicator of character.\n\nThe exemplum prima inter pares would of course be Severian, whose \nelisions damn near _are_ THE BOOK OF THE NEW SUN; but it's true of \nevery first-person narrator from Number 5 to Holly Hollander. By \ntheir falsifications and concealments shall ye know them. \n\nAnd why do the children conceal the \"narrator\"'s identity?\n\nOne immediate possibility, which doesn't feel right to me: the \nchildren are (consciously or un-) e[xc]l[i|u]ding matters which would \ntend to make Silkhorn look more like Horn and less like Silk -- not \nbecause of some quasireligious desire to portray \"Silk\" as the perfect \nman but because the last thing they [H&H, that is] can admit to \nthemselves is that they have in any way rejected their actual father, \nsent him packing off back to the Whorl.\n\nBut the actual nature of their concealments seems to militate against \nthis: they conceal for the wet-firecracker \"final revelation\" \nSilkhorn's discovery that he is in some real sense Silk (we can still \ndisagree about just what that sense is). That doesn't directly bother \nme; Wolfe is just subtle enough to have them unconsciously reveal by \nconcealing what they would actually like to conceal by revealing. \nPerhaps it is exactly at that level of subtlety, though, that my own\nability to track sympathetically with Mr Wolfe's program falls to the \nground: at any rate, it just doesn't work for me. So what do these \nconcealments reveal about the narrators of these sections? \n\nCan their brief interruptions in OBW, conspicuously absent from IGJ, \ncontribute? Really, all they have to add is a few [Sic]s and one note \nthat Nettle has read OBW.\n\n-- But this fact, in and of itself, suggests that there is a \nsignificant gap of time between Silkhorn's implosion therapy at \nRemora's hands and the departure to return one more time to the \n_Whorl_. OBW is a big book and not fast reading in print; it would \ntake Nettle some significant time to read it in holograph, esp. under \nthe circumstances prevalent on Lizard at the time. I should expect a \nminimum of a month or two: plenty of time for Silk(horn) to maunder \nto the children over \"poor Pig\" and so on.\n\nWell, then. Given that time frame, let's take this as a hypothesis: \nthe children's decision to (deliberately) continue the (unconscious) \ntactic of PSH's text and conceal the identity of PasSilkHorn, and\nthe Tomato Surprise ending, constitute _their_ idea of a subtle \nliterary device; which is why it is so clumsily handled. It's pretty \ndamned obvious long before RttW begins that \"the narrator of\" OBW/IGJ \nis wandering around in Silk's body, neh? \n\nLet's take it as given that they have not had the full benefit of a \nliberal education. Is this possible; more importantly, is it \nplausible? Would and could they have done this? \"Would\" is hard,\nand reverts to the question of character; as for \"could\" -- I can\nonly refer you to the huge number of \"primitive\" narratives in the\n\"real\" world that use some startlingly sophisticated techniques.\n\nAssuming that they _could_, and that _would_ defers us to the question \nof character, the immediate critical question is now reduced to this: \n\n\tDoes Mr Wolfe deliberately commit a narrative clumsiness \n\tbecause his narrators would do so? And if so, is this \n\tsubtle or clumsy on Mr Wolfe's part?\n\nThis is your final essay for the semester; it is due in one week.\n(I have some ideas about this but want to see some discussion before\nI spout any further in this direction.)\n\nThere are some fairly obvious objections to this model, which I\nshall attempt to disarm so that it can be discussed on its own\nmerits..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I find it hard to believe, therefore, that they would write prose\nlike \"from time to time ... some motion of Pig's evoked the soft \nspeech of foliage. A faint and liquid music succeeded it, waking\nhis tongue and lips to thirst.\" (50) (Compare this with the \nsections written by Hoof and Daisy individually.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "A fair cop, to some extent. I found Hoof's personal chapters, in\nparticular, almost painfully clumsy compared to the usual Wolfe\nmanner; I don't think I _could_ read an entire book by Hoof. \n\nSo I see these possibilities:\n1. Someone else (most likely \"the Narrator\") wrote the third-person \n chapters and the kids (for whatever reason) take credit for it.\n2. The kids, in collaboration, are able to pastiche the style of \n \"the Narrator\" in a way that they individually cannot.\n3. Writing these sections they deliberately pastiche \"the Narrator\";\n writing in their own voices they don't.\n\nThere are two issues underlying this. First, are we to believe that\nthey are capable of this level of pastiche; second, is there some\ngood reason why they would claim to have written something they did\nnot?\n\nThe second question, again, devolves into the question of character,\nand \"what does this reveal?\" \n\nAs to the first, I can give the half-hearted answer that Hide & Hoof \nare the children of a man whose most notable talent as a youth was \nverbal imitation, not only of Silk's voice but of his style. (Is there \nany reason to believe, by the by, that Silk is the _only_ person he \nwas able so to imitate? Gifted impressionists are very rarely limited \nto a single \"victim,\" Elvis impersonators to the contrary.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Another example is the \"'Seen me h'ears'\" passage. We are given\nthese words of Pig's but no description of his ears, and left to\nmake the correct inferences ourselves." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "(...assuming, of course, that the inferences made here _have_ been\nthe correct ones...)\n\nSimple supposition, which slips nicely under Occam's rule: this is \nhow PSH narrated it to the kids, and they, failing to make the \ncorrect inferences, repeated what they heard/remembered." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Add to these the absence of any discernible difference between\n\"litSilkhorn\" and \"real Silkhorn\" as seen in his own narration. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Again, plausible in terms of pastiche, _if_ we may assume that these\nchapters are pastiche and not stolen." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "All in all, to me the third-person passages read as if Wolfe had\noriginally written them as \"objective\" third-person narrative, and\nonly after the fact decided to attribute them to Hoof, Hide, Vadsig\nand Daisy. " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The only problem with this being that, as far as I can tell, Wolfe\ndoesn't believe in _objective_ narrative." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I'm afraid that I personally did not get a \"kick\" from the \nrevelation of the children's authorship (both in the sense of\nenjoyment, and of a jolt). " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well, we've known since mid-OBW that SHORT is \"edited\" by the\nkids.\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Stephanides", "address": "adamsteph at earthlink.net" }, "date": "2001-03-07T12:26:04+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) For Adam and James: Literary Devices, Authorship, and", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "A very thought-provoking post. I have my doubts that you'll be able to\nnaturalize the children's authorship of the third-person sections, but I've\nmade some comments below." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "on 3/6/01 11:20 AM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes at ddanehy at siebel.com wrote:\nthey seem designed to reveal the\ncharacter of (Pas)silkhorn" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "No Pas! Pas bad!" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "rather than that of Hoof-Hide-Daisy-Vadsig;\nand that just doesn't make a great deal of sense." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Indeed. Moreover, if they do reveal the characters of\nHoof-Hide-Daisy-Vadsig, it's not clear why we should care. None of them are\nparticularly interesting as characters, at least judging by what we see of\nthem." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The exemplum prima inter pares would of course be Severian, whose\nelisions damn near _are_ THE BOOK OF THE NEW SUN; but it's true of\nevery first-person narrator from Number 5 to Holly Hollander." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "You'll have to elaborate on this sometime; this is the first suggestion I've\nseen that there is more to PANDORA than appears on the surface." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Can their brief interruptions in OBW, conspicuously absent from IGJ,\ncontribute? Really, all they have to add is a few [Sic]s and one note\nthat Nettle has read OBW.\n\n-- But this fact, in and of itself, suggests that there is a\nsignificant gap of time between Silkhorn's implosion therapy at\nRemora's hands and the departure to return one more time to the\n_Whorl_. OBW is a big book and not fast reading in print; it would\ntake Nettle some significant time to read it in holograph, esp. under\nthe circumstances prevalent on Lizard at the time. I should expect a\nminimum of a month or two: plenty of time for Silk(horn) to maunder\nto the children over \"poor Pig\" and so on." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I may be missing something, but I don't get your point here. Is it stated\nthat Nettle read the book while \"Horn\" was present? I don't have the book\nwith me, but I doubt that it is. In any case, we are specifically told that\nnone of the children except Daisy saw Silk after the meeting with Remora." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Well, then. Given that time frame, let's take this as a hypothesis:\nthe children's decision to (deliberately) continue the (unconscious)\ntactic of PSH's text and conceal the identity of PasSilkHorn, and\nthe Tomato Surprise ending, constitute _their_ idea of a subtle\nliterary device; which is why it is so clumsily handled. It's pretty\ndamned obvious long before RttW begins that \"the narrator of\" OBW/IGJ\nis wandering around in Silk's body, neh?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes, it's obvious that the narrator is in Silk's body. What is not obvious\nis that he is Silk. At least I don't recall anybody suggesting it on this\nlist, although there was some speculation that \"Horn\" had acquired some of\nSilk's attributes along with his body." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Let's take it as given that they have not had the full benefit of a\nliberal education. Is this possible; more importantly, is it\nplausible? Would and could they have done this? \"Would\" is hard,\nand reverts to the question of character; as for \"could\" -- I can\nonly refer you to the huge number of \"primitive\" narratives in the\n\"real\" world that use some startlingly sophisticated techniques." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't believe that the surprise is clumsy (what is clumsy is the way\nWolfe/the children hammer us over the head with evidence that \"Horn\" is Silk\nevery few pages). When you examine closely what Wolfe/the children do, it\nbecomes clear how sophisticated it is. They certainly don't hide evidence\nthat \"Horn\" is Silk. On two occasions characters come right out and say\nthat he's Silk. And Chapter Four is even entitled \"He Is Silk.\" But what\nthey do is arrange it that the unsuspecting reader (of whom I was one)\ndiscounts all this. Since the narrator of the first-person sections, and\nthe point-of-view character of the third-person sections, always (except for\na few slips) thinks of himself as Horn, we naturally believe him. What is\nmore, we know what Horn knows and the other characters don't: the story of\nHorn's \"spirit transference,\" which (we think) explains why everyone thinks\nthat Horn is Silk. The \"He Is Silk\" chapter title, if we notice it (I\ndidn't on first reading), we assume reflects the viewpoint of the other\ncharacters (this is the chapter in which Hound, Tansy and Pig discuss how\nhe's Silk) and possibly also Horn's dream in which Pig turns out to be Silk.\nAnd with all \"Horn\" thinking of himself as Horn, and insisting that he is\nHorn, and with the third-person sections alternating with first-person\nsections, we never notice that the narrator of the third-person sections\nnever refers to \"Horn\" as Horn. What they have done, in essence, is to\nleave the narrator's identity ambiguous, while hiding the fact that they\nhave done so: \"concealing by revealing,\" to use your phrase above. I would\nargue that this is not only quite sophisticated, but it is sophisticated in\na very particular sense: one that demonstrates familiarity with the\ntechniques of modern fiction, and assumes such familiarity in its readers.\nI'm sure you know more about the history of narrative techniques than me,\nbut I suspect that neither an eighteenth-century novel nor a traditional\nepic poem, to take just two examples, would ever refer to the protagonist in\na third-person narrative only as \"he\", or employ alternating first- and\nthird-person narration without any explanation (at the time), let alone use\nthese devices for the type of legerdemain described above.\n\nIn any case, I suspect that the sophisticated \"primitive\" narratives you\nrefer to are either long-polished folk narratives, or told by specialized\nstorytellers, neither of which applies here." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Assuming that they _could_, and that _would_ defers us to the question\nof character, the immediate critical question is now reduced to this:\n\nDoes Mr Wolfe deliberately commit a narrative clumsiness\nbecause his narrators would do so? And if so, is this\nsubtle or clumsy on Mr Wolfe's part?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " \nMy answers are:\n\n1) No, because he doesn't commit a narrative clumsiness at all.\n\n2) If he did intend the surprise to be deliberately clumsy, then it was\nclumsy, not subtle, on his part, both because the clumsiness of the surprise\nis not clear, and because he's inconsistent the third-person sections are\nelsewhere clearly quite sophisticated (reread the third-person sections of\nChapter One). Even if these objections didn't apply, Wolfe's strategy would\nstill be wrongheaded: he'd be sabotaging the structure of the book to make\nthe trivial point that the children are clumsy narrators." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I find it hard to believe, therefore, that they would write prose\nlike \"from time to time ... some motion of Pig's evoked the soft\nspeech of foliage. A faint and liquid music succeeded it, waking\nhis tongue and lips to thirst.\" (50) (Compare this with the\nsections written by Hoof and Daisy individually.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "So I see these possibilities:\n1. Someone else (most likely \"the Narrator\") wrote the third-person\nchapters and the kids (for whatever reason) take credit for it." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Silkhorn is the only plausible candidate; but there's no indication that he\nwrote these sections, or is even aware of their existence. And why would\nthe children take credit for the third-person sections but not for the\nfirst-person sections?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "2. The kids, in collaboration, are able to pastiche the style of\n\"the Narrator\" in a way that they individually cannot.\n3. Writing these sections they deliberately pastiche \"the Narrator\";\nwriting in their own voices they don't." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I don't think that pastiche is an accurate description. While I'd have to\nreread the book to make sure, it's my impression that at its fanciest (e. g.\nthe passage I quoted), the prose of the third-person segments is more\ncomplex than anything written by Silkhorn. In any case, why would the\nchildren want to pastiche Silkhorn's style, if they're going to acknowledge\nat the end that they wrote the third-person segments?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "is there some\ngood reason why they would claim to have written something they did\nnot?\n\nThe second question, again, devolves into the question of character,\nand \"what does this reveal?\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And \"who cares?\"" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Another example is the \"'Seen me h'ears'\" passage. We are given\nthese words of Pig's but no description of his ears, and left to\nmake the correct inferences ourselves." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "(...assuming, of course, that the inferences made here _have_ been\nthe correct ones...)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "True, but I can't think of any other plausible ones, and in any case Wolfe\nundoubtedly wants us to infer _something_." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Simple supposition, which slips nicely under Occam's rule: this is\nhow PSH narrated it to the kids, and they, failing to make the\ncorrect inferences, repeated what they heard/remembered." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Surely Hide or Hoof would have asked Silkhorn what was so special about\nPig's ears, and there's no reason for Silkhorn not to have told them (and if\nthere was, Silkhorn would have omitted Pig's words)." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Add to these the absence of any discernible difference between\n\"litSilkhorn\" and \"real Silkhorn\" as seen in his own narration." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Again, plausible in terms of pastiche, _if_ we may assume that these\nchapters are pastiche and not stolen." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes; I did not mean that this was inconsistent with the passages being\nwritten by the children, but that it was another instance of the lack of\nanything distinctive about the passages to suggest that they were written by\nthe children." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "All in all, to me the third-person passages read as if Wolfe had\noriginally written them as \"objective\" third-person narrative, and\nonly after the fact decided to attribute them to Hoof, Hide, Vadsig\nand Daisy. " }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The only problem with this being that, as far as I can tell, Wolfe\ndoesn't believe in _objective_ narrative." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "That's why I put the scare quotes. It wasn't a very good choice of words\nanyway, but I think you know what I meant.\n\n--Adam\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Stephanides", "address": "adamsteph at earthlink.net" }, "date": "2001-03-07T15:51:43+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) For Adam and James: Literary Devices, Authorship, and", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "on 3/6/01 1:11 PM, James Jordan at jbjordan4 at home.com wrote:\nI guess we can hypothesize that the Narrator lived among\nthem for a year or so before leaving for the Whorl, and that much of\n\"their\" style is drawn from transcripts of \"his\" narrations." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "No and no. On the night he arrives in New Viron, Silkhorn makes his final\n\"astral journey.\" Hoof tells us that \"After that, Hide and Vadsig came ...\nfor the wedding\" (397); we aren't told how long an interval this \"after\nthat\" indicates, but since Hoof goes on to say that there is nothing in this\ninterval to write about, it can't have been long. And Daisy tells us\nexplicitly that her final meeting with Silk, the only time after the Remora\ninterview that any of the children see him, took place \"a few days\" after\nthe wedding. (410) And at this meeting Silk says that they are leaving that\nnight. So the overall time from Silkhorn's arrival at New Viron to Silk's\ndeparture was almost certainly less than a month, and possibly a good deal\nshorter; and for some of this time Silk was not doing any reminiscing.\n\nNo transcripts either; if there had been, the editors, who are concerned to\nestablish the accuracy of their account, would have said so. All they say\nis that Silkhorn \"often\" spoke of his time on the Whorl, and \"we have\nrecreated [it] to the best of our ability, based upon those conversations.\"\n(408) While this doesn't bear out mantis's description of the third-person\nsections as \"fanfic,\" it does imply that minor details in the Whorl section,\nparticularly individual lines of dialogue and what is said to be passing\nthrough Silkhorn's mind, cannot be trusted.\n\n--Adam\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Stephanides", "address": "adamsteph at earthlink.net" }, "date": "2001-03-07T23:41:08+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) For Adam and James: Literary Devices, Authorship, and", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "on 3/7/01 6:20 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes at ddanehy at siebel.com wrote:\nI may be missing something, but I don't get your point here.\nIs it stated that Nettle read the book while \"Horn\" was present?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Ummm... when else _could_ she have read it? The _only_ time\nfor her to read it (and for the children to know she has\nread it and say so) is after \"the Narrator\" arrives but before\nhe departs -- because she departs with him. Ergo, he was in\nNew Viron long enough for her to read it." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Whoops--that little fact had completely slipped my mind. So your final\nsentence here is of course correct. I would still suggest, though, that\nthis time period is not necessarily as long as you claimed in your original\npost (\"a minimum of a month or two\"). I finished RTTW in a few days, and\nNettle would have had more motivation to read OBW quickly. As for the issue\nof handwriting, if the Narrator's handwriting is the same as Horn's she\nwould have had a lot of practice reading it. Even if not, Silk's\nhandwriting would presumably be of the same type as Horn's and hence fairly\neasy for her to read. And, given her presumed desire to find out who this\nguy is who claims to be her husband and has his memories, but doesn't look\nlike him or talk much like him, she would probably not stop on a first\nreading to decipher every difficult word, which would make things go\nquicker.\n\n--Adam\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] } ] }