Subject: (whorl) coo coup/fish & fowl

From: m.driussi <m.driussi at genie.com>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 00:56:00 +0000

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

Reply:  Item #7776624 from WHORL at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET01#

alga,

Re: Thecla/half-sister Thea(/Catherine?--if she's a khaibit of one or
the other) coo, good point.  Re: Church of the Conciliator, another good
point.  (Maybe I'm just remembering them from you telling me before, but
I was about to mention them for you anyway.)

(You know, I'm becoming more convinced that you would really
appreciate Peter Wright's essays in that "Foundation No. 66"--now I'm
down to wondering if you would have anything to argue against them
beyond simple quibbles!)

Vance,

Re: ghost of Pike, you are right, of course--a third possibility is
that "things are really what they seem" and thus the ghost is a
"real" ghost rather than a computer generated eidolon or
"techno-ghost" (from New Sun and end of EXODUS THE LONG SUN).  But I
think that, even if this is true, it has pretty much the same effect
as if it were an eidolon--in other words, it has a greater reality
than the forgery of Quetzal disguising himself as Pike.

There is definitely a tie between Quetzal and Pike.  For starters,
Quetzal is most likely the same devil/vampire that Pike fended off so
many years ago.

Personally, I think the explanation for the appearance of ghostpike
is that Quetzal accidentally brought Pike down from Main Frame.  The
sequence goes like this: Silk is summoned to fight vampire; Silk carves
his name five stories up [Talon's note: "five," but that's another story!],
along with Pike's name, as a talisman against vampires (I've seen this
sort of thing in vampire lit, too--sometimes the cross is a swastika, I
think); Quetzalreturns for more young blood, sees the names carved there,
and "goes wide" by his own account to Remora (so the magic works--go figure);
Quetzal, obviously thinking of old times with Pike, maybe even checking the
records at Main Frame ("Isn't that old codger =dead= yet?  Oh yeah,
here it is--died last year.  Go back to sleep, ghost."), flies over to Sun
Street manteion for a peek at this presumptive heir to Pike; catches ghostgirl
Mucor (in the buff) in Silk's room and flies back out; then [thank you for
your patience] ENTER PIKE, just like how Bustard wanders back from the land
of the dead following Auk back, or like how Silk meets his four parents in the
same way.

See, Pike followed Quetzal back to the land of the living for a quick
visit and was happy with what he saw. OR psi-magically, having both
Quetzal and Silk thinking about Pike made mischivous Mucor go wake
the ghost up for a visit, in the same way she seems to activate the
other "sleeping" gods of Viron.

Re: Rose having a daughter (1, p. 69).  Nope.  I think that passage is
referring to Scylla, the daughter of Echidna, rather than any mortal
daughter.

Re: how did Silk kill Hierax the bird.  Well, as I understand it, the
bird's wings were clipped so it couldn't fly away.  As Silk was
losing conciousness he managed to push the bird off the roof and it
fell to its death.

Re: Urus and the Triv at the tavern.  One thing this suggests is that
Urus was not previously employed by Trivigaunte--otherwise he would
have brought this up.  Urus is the one that Mint says is Evil.  The
information he gives leads to the attempted assassination of Spider,
doesn't it?  (I'm trying to remember.  Eland is killed, mistaken for
Spider--and a lynx dies, too.  Ordered by Siyuf, presumably carried
out by Willet/Hossaan.)  Silk puzzled it together about that far, I
think, and told somebody who told Horn.

=mantis=