{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/1516", "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": 1516, "subject": "Too literal on everything?", "messages": 5, "voices": 3, "first": "2002-01-03T03:21:47+00:00", "last": "2002-01-04T10:39:29+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "maa32", "address": "maa32 at dana.ucc.nau.edu" }, "date": "2002-01-03T03:21:47+00:00", "subject": "Too literal on everything?", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Very interesting stuff about the Maternal paganism in Wolfe, Nutria. Thanks \nfor sharing your conversation with Wolfe.\n\nHey Andy, when you say I'm being too literal, do you mean about all my word \nconnections or just that Blue/Green time travel thing? Severian doesn't seem \nto have any problem traveling through time. The only thing I think is very \ninteresting in the text about what whorls we should consider when dealing with \ninhumu is when the narrator claims (with some authority)that there are only \nthree whorls involved: the whorl, green, and blue. Why, then, does Merryn \nhave a problem with animals on the Red Sun Whorl (certainly a few thousand \nyears would change the constellations, too), and why does Jahlee bring it up? \nWhat does it mean? I've just found it interesting how Wolfe can infuse \nrepetitive words with associations that they normally do not have (for \nexample, read The Book of the New Sun and look at how many times water and \nhealing are mixed, as well as flooding and salvation -> it happens over and \nover and over ad nauseum. Obviously, salvation requires a big flood -> and you \ndidn't really have to read Urth of the New Sun to make that association) I'm \njust exploring those word associations, and whether they are fruitful or not. \nI have always felt that was a good way to read Wolfe (like that whole elm tree \nbeing associated with death in Peace, or noticing in the Book of the New Sun \nthat every time a scary beast shows up, Hethor shows up, too -> I think Wolfe \nonly provides the exposition half the time). Certainly I am not even \nconfident in most of my explorations -> I'm just drawing weird connections. \nAnd you must admit that in a book about a journey home, it does not seem very \noff the wall that there might be some way to reconcile Blue and Green with \nthat homeward journey (especially since their orbits pass within 30,000 \nleagues of each other). And if you've ever read Books in the Book of the New \nSun which equates a masters thesis with the story of Theseus or the BINDING OF \nA BOOK with the upcoming appearance of Dorcas, then you know that Wolfe is \nentirely capable of making the most bizarre and surprising connections in the \nuniverse.\nMarc Aramini" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andy Robertson", "address": "andywrobertson at clara.co.uk" }, "date": "2002-01-03T10:31:56+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Too literal on everything?", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I mean primarily the Green/Blue thing, but it has applicability elsewhere.\n\nThe question about whether Green and Blue are Lune and Ushas or even St Anne\nand St Croix in literal truth is irrelevant. They are figures, archetypes,\nof something inside Wolfe. Perhaps he had a dream once.\n\nSo in one sense they are Ushas/Lune, and in another they are not. Wolfe\nwould not be able to answer the question because he does not yet \"know\"\nhimself.\n\nI am sure that if we knew the story of Severian's visit to Lune we would\nunderstand better. But Wolfe has not written it down yet, so it hasn't\nhappened, so even Wolfe does not know the answer.\n\n\n\nIt just seems to me that Wolfe is playing it by ear and sometimes has no\nclear idea of what is going on himself. He has these massively mythic\nfigures and he combines them and recombines them at his whim. He relies\non instinct. Sometimes he is really writing about a sort of dreamspace.\nSometimes it is literal. But always it is the mythic import, the moral\nmeaning, that counts, and worrying about things like can inhumi actually\nswim through space is not relevant.\n\nIf Wolfe wants them to, they will.\n\nI am not criticising your attempts to pick up clues. That is part of the\njoy in reading Wolfe. But I will note that if you start looking at\nanything with a number tagged on to it as a clue you are sure to be misled.\nWolfe is never *quanitative* in any meaningful way. His universe is too\ndreamy and fluid.\n\n\n Andy R\n\n\n\n\n\n----- Original Message -----" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "From: \"maa32\" \nHey Andy, when you say I'm being too literal, do you mean about all my\nword\nconnections or just that Blue/Green time travel thing?" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "James Jordan", "address": "jbjordan4 at home.com" }, "date": "2002-01-03T22:08:46+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Too literal on everything?", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 08:21 PM 1/2/2002 -0700, you wrote:\nVery interesting stuff about the Maternal paganism in Wolfe, Nutria. Thanks\nfor sharing your conversation with Wolfe.\n\nHey Andy, when you say I'm being too literal, do you mean about all my word\nconnections or just that Blue/Green time travel thing? Severian doesn't seem\nto have any problem traveling through time." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Yes, but that's only after he's travelled to the sub-heaven of \nYesod, and died (again) and been brought back (again) on the Ship. Severian \nhas a fairly unique gift and calling, to be the Conciliator, to be a kind \nof Christ-Apollo to Urth. (He's not Christ; that's the \"theoanthropos\" of \nancient time.) I don't think we can transfer Severian's unique gifts, and \nespecially those gifts as transformed through his deaths and resurrections, \nto other people in the Urth universe.\n BTW, does anyone else see a hint of *Perelandra* in Green? A \n\"fallen Perelandra\" perhaps? Lush and verdant and corrupt, and needing a \n\"Ransom\" to at least begin to set things right -- to go underground and \nfight \"un-men\" and remove the sewage? Of am I streaming my consciousness \ntoo much? If this guess is anywhere near the mark, perhaps the Neighbor \nreally is a kind of \"angel\" to guide \"Ransom/Horn\" to do this initially \nredemptive work. The Neighbors want to redeem Green." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I've just found it interesting how Wolfe can infuse\nrepetitive words with associations that they normally do not have (for\nexample, read The Book of the New Sun and look at how many times water and\nhealing are mixed, as well as flooding and salvation -> it happens over and\nover and over ad nauseum. Obviously, salvation requires a big flood -> and \nyou\ndidn't really have to read Urth of the New Sun to make that association)" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " Well, as I'm sure you got, this is all reflections on the \nsacrament of Holy Baptism, beginning with Severian's initial baptismal \ndrowning and resurrection. There are lots of reflections on the Holy \nEucharist throughout also. And these were quite deliberate, as Gene \naffirmed to me.\n Severian's baptismal death and resurrection at the beginning \nsimply foreshadows (and in-personates, since he is the \"messiah\" who walks \nthe path before the rest of us) the baptism of Urth into Ushas at the end, \nand tells us how we should consider that flood.\n\nJust a coupla thoughts.\n\nNutria" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "James Jordan", "address": "jbjordan4 at home.com" }, "date": "2002-01-03T22:29:43+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Too literal on everything?", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "At 10:31 AM 1/3/2002 +0000, Andy wrote to Marc:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I mean primarily the Green/Blue thing, but it has applicability elsewhere.\n\nThe question about whether Green and Blue are Lune and Ushas or even St Anne\nand St Croix in literal truth is irrelevant. They are figures, archetypes,\nof something inside Wolfe. Perhaps he had a dream once." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": " I don't think they correspond, save they each is a duality that \ninvites reflection. Lune is green in anticipation of the Green Man, where \nGreen is green in a primordial and fallen way. They are at opposite ends of \nthe temporal/eschatological spectrum. In other words, Lune relates to Urth \neschatologically, while Green relates to Blue protologically. The two \nworlds in *Fifth Head* are tyrant and slave, exploiter and exploited.\n The fact that each pair is joined as a pair, somehow, has \nsomething to do with society. Humans need to relate to abos with kindness, \nnot exploitation. Humans on Blue must also redeem somehow the inhumi of \nGreen -- Horn/Silk makes a start of this on Green and on Blue, and the Book \nof Horn will carry forth his story and that programme.\n I think Lune is just kind of up in the sky, in the heavens, an \nimage of Yesod in a way. If the humans of Urth could ever learn to rule \ntheir own little world, they might grow up to rule a universe like Briah, \nand become like the sub-angels of Yesod -- when they have become Green Men.\n But I don't think these double planets are supposed to BE the same \nplaces (obviously not), nor that they mean the same things in the three \nnovels." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "It just seems to me that Wolfe is playing it by ear and sometimes has no\nclear idea of what is going on himself. He has these massively mythic\nfigures and he combines them and recombines them at his whim. He relies\non instinct. Sometimes he is really writing about a sort of dreamspace.\nSometimes it is literal. But always it is the mythic import, the moral\nmeaning, that counts, and worrying about things like can inhumi actually\nswim through space is not relevant.\n\nIf Wolfe wants them to, they will.\n\nI am not criticising your attempts to pick up clues. That is part of the\njoy in reading Wolfe. But I will note that if you start looking at\nanything with a number tagged on to it as a clue you are sure to be misled.\nWolfe is never *quanitative* in any meaningful way. His universe is too\ndreamy and fluid." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Hmm. Not sure about this. Wolfe rewrites his big hypernovels several times, \nand I think he works to make them internally consistent. The problems are \n(a) that his \"universe\" is bigger than the modern secular universe, with \nangels (fallen and unfallen), ghosts, a living God, prophets and prophetic \ndreams, etc.; (b) that his narrators definitely have \"limited omniscience\" \nand may even be deceptive at points; (c) that there are correspondences \nbetween myths, archetypes, earlier events, and present events; (d) etc. But \nas a trained engineer, Wolfe has surely figured out how the inhumi get to \nBlue. If he makes mistakes in the area of science and engineering, they are \naccidents, not the result of writing a dreamscape. Or so it seems to me.\n\nNutria" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Andy Robertson", "address": "andywrobertson at clara.co.uk" }, "date": "2002-01-04T10:39:29+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Too literal on everything?", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "----- Original Message -----" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "From: \"James Jordan\" \n\n I don't think they correspond, save they each is a duality that\ninvites reflection. I think Lune is just\nkind of up in the sky, in the heavens, an image of Yesod\nin a way. If the humans of Urth could ever learn to rule\ntheir own little world, they might grow up to rule a universe like Briah,\nand become like the sub-angels of Yesod -- when they have become Green\nMen.\n But I don't think these double planets are supposed to BE the\nsame\nplaces (obviously not), nor that they mean the same things in the three\nnovels." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Very wisely put.\n\nI wish even more that we had seen that visit of Severian to Lune. And I\nagree about Perelandra showing through in the Green worlds, just a bit.\nRansom in the caves.\n\nOne other pattern of Green and Blue in the deep strata of SF - Earth/Moon in\nHothouse. But Earth is \"Green\"." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Wolfe is never *quanitative* in any meaningful way. His universe is\ntoo\ndreamy and fluid." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": " Wolfe has surely figured out how the inhumi get to\nBlue. If he makes mistakes in the area of science and engineering, they\nare\naccidents, not the result of writing a dreamscape. Or so it seems to me." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "He hasn't because there is no way they can. As a trained physicist, trust\nme on this.\n\nI'm not accusing Wolfe of doing anything more than the average SF writer\ndoes.\n\nEnergy beam weapons, blasters, FTL of any sort, are all nonsense in terms of\nreal scientific practicality, but are familiar SF tropes.\n\nWolfe employs them all but allows a little mysticsim rather then bullshit\npseudosience into his \"explanations\".\n\nThe inhumi's ability to fly through space is of a part with this: it is no\nmore possible than FTL flight would be in the real universe.\n\nIt exists because Wolfe's dreams demand thet the evil inhumi come from Green\nand come **naked**, flying through space like the spirit-ghost-dream-images\nof humanity they are\n\n(and there's another echo: Lovecraft's night-gaunts)\n\n\n Andy R" } ] } ] }