{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/1366", "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": 1366, "subject": "why the problem with astral travel?", "messages": 3, "voices": 3, "first": "2001-04-18T08:53:29+00:00", "last": "2001-04-19T08:53:57+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maa32", "address": "maa32 at dana.ucc.nau.edu" }, "date": "2001-04-18T08:53:29+00:00", "subject": "(whorl) why the problem with astral travel?", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I really don't see why some are so distraught over Wolfe's use of a really big \nGodling or astral travel. Severian's relationship with the new sun seems \nequally mysterious. How can a man freely travel back and forth in time just \nbecause he has some affinity with a star? without mechanical \"SF\" \nenhancement, how does Wolfe really explain Severian's connection? How about \nsilk's auto-resurrection at the end of Calde of the Long Sun? I really don't \nthink that access to the corridor of time is any different than travelling \nthrough space with a mental projection. The sorceror in Sword of the Lictor \nis clearly a psionicist. Is his mental fortitude any different than magic or \nastral projection? Does a device or genetic alteration allow him to use his \nmental powers? I don't think so. According to A.D. + D., astral projection \nis a well established psionic ability, as is conjunction with another mind. \nThe godlings might very well be mechanical. who cares?\n\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "William Ansley", "address": "wansley at warwick.net" }, "date": "2001-04-18T23:30:02+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) why the problem with astral travel?", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 8:53 AM -0700 4/18/01, maa32 wrote:\nI really don't see why some are so distraught over Wolfe's use of a really big\nGodling or astral travel. Severian's relationship with the new sun seems\nequally mysterious. How can a man freely travel back and forth in time just\nbecause he has some affinity with a star? without mechanical \"SF\"\nenhancement, how does Wolfe really explain Severian's connection? How about\nsilk's auto-resurrection at the end of Calde of the Long Sun? I really don't\nthink that access to the corridor of time is any different than travelling\nthrough space with a mental projection. The sorceror in Sword of the Lictor\nis clearly a psionicist. Is his mental fortitude any different than magic or\nastral projection? Does a device or genetic alteration allow him to use his\nmental powers? I don't think so. According to A.D. + D., astral projection\nis a well established psionic ability, as is conjunction with another mind. \nThe godlings might very well be mechanical. who cares?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I am one of those who complained about the \"impossible\" size of the \ngodlings as not being \"science fictional.\" You know what? You are \nright. This was a silly objection on my part, considering all of the \nstuff I have swallowed without complaint in other so-called SF. (Time \ntravel, FTL drives and \"Psi powers\" are just the beginning.)\n\nThis however doesn't mean that I don't still object to the godlings' \nsize or the astral projection. Neither of these things added anything \nessential to the story as far as I was concerned and both created \nconfusion and loose ends (the godlings a little and astral projection \na lot).\n\nNow, I can only assume that both of these parts of the story are \nessential, since Wolfe wrote it and he is very careful about such \nthings, and I am just missing the point. But I am not at all sure I \nam willing to give this series years as some have recommended. I \nwouldn't have given TBotNS or Peace years of rereading if there \nwasn't some aspect of these books I enjoyed from the start. I am hard \npressed to find this aspect in TBotSS.\n\nI am becoming convinced that my problem with TBotSS is that it is \nWolfe's most explicitly religious (long) work and I am an areligious \nperson. If this is so, I don't think I am ever going to care for it \nmore than I do now.\n\nWilliam Ansley\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Straight", "address": "straight at email.unc.edu" }, "date": "2001-04-19T08:53:57+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) why the problem with astral travel?", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Wed, 18 Apr 2001, William Ansley wrote:\nI am one of those who complained about the \"impossible\" size of the \ngodlings as not being \"science fictional.\" You know what? You are \nright. This was a silly objection on my part, considering all of the \nstuff I have swallowed without complaint in other so-called SF. (Time \ntravel, FTL drives and \"Psi powers\" are just the beginning.)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I thought the main objection to the godlings is that in Act 1 (New Sun)\nthe author goes into detail about why anything that big would have to live\nin the sea or collapse under its own weight and then in Act 3 he presents\nus with such a creature without giving us any hint of how it is possible,\nor even a sense that we're supposed to see this as a physics-defying\nmiracle (and Typhon/Mainframe's wonders seem to be otherwise\ntechnological, unlike the \"miraculous\" wonders of Severian or Silkhorn's\nastral travel).\n\n(Maybe our hint is in Act 2 at the talus construction plant, but then what\ndo you do with the obvious hints that organic Pig (he eats, his eyes are\nflesh) is a godling?)\n\n-Rostrum\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] } ] }