{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/1457", "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": 1457, "subject": "Wombat on TBOTSS and fanfic", "messages": 5, "voices": 3, "first": "2001-06-21T12:15:20+00:00", "last": "2001-06-21T18:44:37+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com" }, "date": "2001-06-21T12:15:20+00:00", "subject": "(whorl) Wombat on TBOTSS and fanfic", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Wombat, he quoted and wrote:\nAt 05:26 PM 6/20/01 -0700, Mantis wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "So the writing by H & H, while buttressed by interviews, snatches of\nconversation, and editorial consensus, amounts to a patch written by fans,\nwhich is rather like a fan fiction in the broad sense (rather than the\nspecific sense of \"slash\" or \"Mary Sue\")." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "\"Fanfic\" is not the same thing as \"fiction written by fans\"; \"fan\" is not\nthe same thing as \"admirer of\"; \"biography\" is not the same as \"fiction\"." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Ah. Okay.\n\nApparently I'm being so sloppy with terms that I'm nearly incomprehensible.\n\nSHORT/LONG SUN EARTH\nbiography fiction\nautobiography fiction\nbiography masked as autobiography fiction\nautobiography masked as biography fiction\ndocudrama fiction\nbased on a true story fiction\n\nIn TBOTSS, the power of the text is important: the text being TBOTLS.\n\nMany people on Blue have read TBOTLS, a biography in novel form * (rather\nlike the Little House on the Prairie series, come to think of it). People\nwho have never met Silk in the flesh are huge \"admirers of\" him, to the\npoint that, for example, Gaon launches an expedition to get Silk from the\nWhorl, just as New Viron does.\n\nNow then, the Little House books are not exactly \"biography\" or\n\"autobiography,\" (in the shelving sense for libraries and bookstores) but\nthey are close, since they were written by a participant (Laura) and/or her\ndaughter (Rose). (Contrast with THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN, which\nclaims to be biography, and may have some basis in the childhood\nexperiences of \"Mark Twain,\" but is understood to be fiction unencumbered\nby biography.)\n\nThe Little House series proved popular, and more books have been written\n(to fill in the gaps before and behind) by people further removed: the\nLittle Farm in the Ozarks books, if I got the title right, are presumably\nmore reliant upon texts (historical texts, the Little House books, diaries,\netc.) than direct personal experience of the life and times of Laura. So\nthe Ozarks books are a species of fiction, written \"in the tradition of\"\nand \"continuing the saga of\" an earlier series of\nfiction-based-on-autobiography books; but the autobiographical/first person\npov has dropped out and been replaced with the fabrication (within limits\nset by historical facts and the flavors established by the master text) of\nhuge \"admirers of\" who have read all the other books, know all the relevant\nhistory, and can generate an esthetically competant text (semi-pastiche?).\n\nWhatever.\n\nFunny, I don't recall all this definition gaming/term policing when people\nwere calling Robert Borski's work \"fanfic\"--I guess I must've dozed and\nmissed all of his slash and Mary Sue stuff! (I could've sworn that others\nused this term, but who knows, perhaps I started misusing it even then!)\n\nBut yes, on another topic (or is it? hmmm), I did enjoy PALE FIRE greatly.\nMore than ADA. About as much as LOLITA, I guess.\n\n* If you are going to argue that TBOTLS is, within its universe, strict\nBIOGRAPHY as opposed to BIOGRAPHY IN NOVEL FORM (`\"biography\" is not the\nsame as \"fiction\"') then by all means, make your argument.\n\n=mantis=\n\n\nSirius Fiction\nHas Moved To\nhttp://www.siriusfiction.com/\n\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Kevin J. Maroney", "address": "kmaroney at ungames.com" }, "date": "2001-06-21T16:32:02+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Wombat on TBOTSS and fanfic", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 12:15 PM 6/21/01 -0700, Mantis wrote:\nSHORT/LONG SUN EARTH\nbiography fiction\nautobiography fiction\nbiography masked as autobiography fiction\nautobiography masked as biography fiction\ndocudrama fiction\nbased on a true story fiction" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm not sure what point this table is making. You're being too compressed \nagain." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Many people on Blue have read TBOTLS, a biography in novel form *" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Actually, they've read _The Book of Silk_, but I mostly agree with your \ncharacterization of it as \"a biography in novel form\"." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "People\nwho have never met Silk in the flesh are huge \"admirers of\" him..." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yes. But they're not \"fans\" of Silk any more than the author of \"Acts of \nthe Apostles\" was a \"fan\" of Jesus, Paul, and Peter. They're historians \nwriting historical narrative for a didactic purpose." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Funny, I don't recall all this definition gaming/term policing when people\nwere calling Robert Borski's work \"fanfic\"--I guess I must've dozed and\nmissed all of his slash and Mary Sue stuff! (I could've sworn that others\nused this term, but who knows, perhaps I started misusing it even then!)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I missed the initial discussion and only noticed it when Blattid put \n\"fanfic\" in the subject line. Checking the archives, I can't find anyone \nusing the term \"fanfic\" to describe Borski's pieces.\n\nThe term was introduced into the discussion to describe *Wolfe's* work as \nbeing fanfic-like--\"wouldn't it be neat if Silk met Severian?\" is the type \nof impulse which drives fanfic. But it makes no sense to apply the term to \nwhat Hoof and Hide (or any other unnamed redactors) are doing, because \nthey're not writing fiction about fictional characters." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Wombat, a.k.a. Kevin Maroney kmaroney at ungames.com\nKitchen Staff Supervisor, New York Review of Science Fiction\nhttp://www.nyrsf.com\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at siriusfiction.com" }, "date": "2001-06-21T15:13:05+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Wombat on TBOTSS and fanfic", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wombat wrote" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I'm not sure what point this table is making. You're being too compressed\nagain." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Something we can agree on." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Many people on Blue have read TBOTLS, a biography in novel form *" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Actually, they've read _The Book of Silk_, but I mostly agree with your\ncharacterization of it as \"a biography in novel form\"." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Sorry, you are wrong! Unless what you really meant to write was: \"the\nauthor Horn thought of the title as being (or even planned to name it) BOOK\nOF SILK, but it became known as THE BOOK OF THE LONG SUN\" (see EXODUS p.\n371).\n\nOr do you mean that they read that other guy's book (the \"other book\"\nmentioned in the text)?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "People\nwho have never met Silk in the flesh are huge \"admirers of\" him..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Yes. But they're not \"fans\" of Silk any more than the author of \"Acts of\nthe Apostles\" was a \"fan\" of Jesus, Paul, and Peter. They're historians\nwriting historical narrative for a didactic purpose." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Why do you seem to be arguing with me when I'm using the terms you want me\nto use? I didn't write \"fans,\" I wrote \"admirers of.\"\n\nI should take you to task for saying they are \"historians.\" Good grief!\n\n=mantis=\n\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Kevin J. Maroney", "address": "kmaroney at ungames.com" }, "date": "2001-06-21T18:44:37+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Wombat on TBOTSS and fanfic", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 03:13 PM 6/21/01 -0700, Mantis wrote:\nSorry, you are wrong! " }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Oops. You're right." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "People\nwho have never met Silk in the flesh are huge \"admirers of\" him..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Yes. But they're not \"fans\" of Silk any more than the author of \"Acts of\nthe Apostles\" was a \"fan\" of Jesus, Paul, and Peter. They're historians\nwriting historical narrative for a didactic purpose." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Why do you seem to be arguing with me when I'm using the terms you want\nme to use? I didn't write \"fans,\" I wrote \"admirers of.\"" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Because you seem to be veering towards using \"admirers of\" as a \nfive-syllable perfect synonym of \"fan\", which it isn't. That's why I said \n\"yes\"--they are admirers --but went on to restate that they are not \"fans\"." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I should take you to task for saying they are \"historians.\" Good grief!" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "They're historians but not in a modern sense; they're historians in the \nsense that the author of the Book of Kings was a historian, or, as I said, \n\"Luke\", the author of Acts of the Apostles was a historian. I've just \nspent too long reading _Surpassing Wonder_ and the term stuck in my mind.\n\nSkimming the archives, I think the comparison between the third-person \nportions of Hoof & Hide's book (*) and _The Killer Angels_ is spot-on.\n\n*Do we know what _The Book of the Short Sun_ is called among its readers?" }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Wombat, a.k.a. Kevin Maroney kmaroney at ungames.com\nKitchen Staff Supervisor, New York Review of Science Fiction\nhttp://www.nyrsf.com\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": "2001-06-21T18:09:41+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Wombat on TBOTSS and fanfic", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "on 6/21/01 5:44 PM, Kevin J. Maroney at kmaroney at ungames.com wrote:\nSkimming the archives, I think the comparison between the third-person\nportions of Hoof & Hide's book (*) and _The Killer Angels_ is spot-on." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Thanks." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "*Do we know what _The Book of the Short Sun_ is called among its readers?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "We know what the editors called it: _Book of the Short Sun_ (RttW, 410).\n\n--Adam\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun." } ] } ] }