Subject: (whorl) Just my two cents...

From: Marcos B. Gouvea <m_gouvea at colby.edu>
Date: Wed, 05 Mar 1997 21:13:36 +0000

[Posted from Whorl, the mailing list for Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun]

	Well, I really must say that it took me a while to work up
the guts to post here- you guys are really experienced, and this is
my first Wolfe series! I have a few (most likely misguided) theories
about the happenings in the Whorl. Please excuse repeated subjects,
I've been saving info up for a while. 

  Could it be that Mint is so charged up by Kypris because she too is
an embryo? I think she said she had to change what she was or forget
some problem of one kind or another. Maybe she was designed to be put
in charge of an army, and became timid when she became a maytera.
Kypris may have turned her on again.

  Here's a twist: I heard some discussion about whether or not Kypris
was in Hy all the time- what if the opposite is true? Don't the gods
take pieces of people they possess? Chenille-Kypris says that every
time
someone is possessed, a bit of the god stays in the person and a bit
of
the person stays in the god. Hy was "played with" by Kypris, I
believe, and maybe now Kypris thinks she's a goddess but isn't, and
Hy thinks she's a mortal but isn't. 

This also would explain Sphigx' policy of no images in her city.
Maybe she won't appear because she's afraid of becoming human...

One more about this reverse-possession: What if everybody's favorite 
bloodsucker travelled up to the Whorl to find out what it was, and 
discovered a monitor screen wherever he came in. A god possessed 
him (possibly Echidna or Scylla), and instilled an urgent need to get

the people of the Whorl down to a planet. Echidna or whatever god 
subsequently inherited Quetzal's evil temptations (including the 
symbol of the snake!).

	These are all long shots, but who knows?

	Another idea: why on Urth would Tartaros want to save all of
Pas's nasty parts? If I were him, I'd have filtered out Pas's spirit
and molded him into what was needed before I stored him- castrated
him, lets say. :-) This would be a sort of neutral ground between Pas
is a Puppet and Pas is for Real.

	Just to wrap up: what is the relationship between Quetzal and
Pike? Quetzal seems to respect him, but at the same time may have
been playing cat and mouse with him. How did Pike find out about 
"devils invading the Whorl"? Maybe Pike turned him to religion? 

	I've seen a few ideas for Blood's dad, but I don't buy it. I
think it might be one of the Ayuntamiento, but not Lemur (as I
thought someone suggested). Lemur's was not the sort of person to
provoke Rose to say that she promised not to reveal his identity- he
sounds like he would make her say "He broke two of my fingers and
said he would break every bone in my BODY if anyone found out!" But,
then again... I may not be subtle enough.

	One last question: what IS rust?

				---Quill (Marcos Gouvea)

=====================================================
Marcos Gouvea--------------------------m_gouvea at colby.edu

"I mean are we talking Thicko City here or what?"
        -- Gaspode the wonder dog 
           (Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures)

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