{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/219", "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": 219, "subject": "Smith & Vance", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "1997-03-18T03:32:00+00:00", "last": "1997-03-18T14:15:56+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "m.driussi", "address": "m.driussi at genie.com" }, "date": "1997-03-18T03:32:00+00:00", "subject": "(whorl) Smith & Vance", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Reply: Item #4788907 from WHORL at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET00#\n\nNutria,\n\nOTOH we know (from interviews as well as Wolfe-written articles) that Gene\nWolfe read and deeply admired Jack Vance's THE DYING EARTH. And most\nreaders, I think, will sense a certain similarity in writing styles\nbetween Vance and Wolfe: high style, macabre humor, cultural\nanthropology, etc.\n\nYet (and maybe this is just me, I don't know) Wolfe's work in spirit\nand in tone is actually much closer to Cordwainer Smith's work than\nit is to Vance's. Part of this is probably [hedgeword] due to the\nfact that nearly all of the time [hedge] Vance is lambasting Religion\nas a controlling tool used by the dominant minority over the gullible\npopulation. Vance belongs to a tradition of anti-religion genre\nwriters going back to Edgar Rice Burroughs and before. (He is also a\nsatirist of the arbitrary conventions found in every society.)\n\nSo the paradox: TBOTNS is said to be (and understood to be) a\ndescendant of Vance's THE DYING EARTH (and Clark Ashton Smith's\n\"Zothique,\" but I don't want to argue about that at the moment ),\nyet in reality TBOTNS is more like Cordwainer Smith's work, =even\nthough= nobody is claiming that Wolfe ever read such.\n\n(Personally I see a lot of difference between Herbert's work and\nCordwainer Smith's work: in soundbyte terms, because Herbert is\nworking out Machiavellian themes and Smith is working out Christian\nthemes. [Now, I am aware that there is a reading of DUNE that sees it\nas a wonderful affirmation of Islam--not to detract from those who\nbelieve this, still I remain sceptical, due to the Machiavellian\nfocus of much of Herbert's work.])\n\n=mantis=\n\nQuestions or problems to whorl-owner at lists.best.com" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Jim Jordan", "address": "jbjordan at gnt.net" }, "date": "1997-03-18T14:15:56+00:00", "subject": "Re: (whorl) Smith & Vance", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Mantis,\n\n\tOh, yeah. Wolfe loves Vance. He told me nothing of Vance's should ever go\nout of print. Probably an exaggeration.\n\n\tI agree regarding perspective re: Dune and Norstrilia. But the\nsimilarities are superficially striking. The story of a young (super-)man's\ncoming of age. Extension of life from always-dying sheep (Christian symbol)\nor sandworms (potentially symbol of evil, but not in Herbert, I think).\nThat's all I had in mind.\n\n\tWell, back to Wolfe!\n\nNutria the Rat" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "At 03:32 AM 3/18/97 GMT, you wrote:\n\n[Posted from Whorl, the mailing list for Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun]\n\nReply: Item #4788907 from WHORL at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET00#\n\nNutria,\n\nOTOH we know (from interviews as well as Wolfe-written articles) that Gene\nWolfe read and deeply admired Jack Vance's THE DYING EARTH. And most\nreaders, I think, will sense a certain similarity in writing styles\nbetween Vance and Wolfe: high style, macabre humor, cultural\nanthropology, etc.\n\nYet (and maybe this is just me, I don't know) Wolfe's work in spirit\nand in tone is actually much closer to Cordwainer Smith's work than\nit is to Vance's. Part of this is probably [hedgeword] due to the\nfact that nearly all of the time [hedge] Vance is lambasting Religion\nas a controlling tool used by the dominant minority over the gullible\npopulation. Vance belongs to a tradition of anti-religion genre\nwriters going back to Edgar Rice Burroughs and before. (He is also a\nsatirist of the arbitrary conventions found in every society.)\n\nSo the paradox: TBOTNS is said to be (and understood to be) a\ndescendant of Vance's THE DYING EARTH (and Clark Ashton Smith's\n\"Zothique,\" but I don't want to argue about that at the moment ),\nyet in reality TBOTNS is more like Cordwainer Smith's work, =even\nthough= nobody is claiming that Wolfe ever read such.\n\n(Personally I see a lot of difference between Herbert's work and\nCordwainer Smith's work: in soundbyte terms, because Herbert is\nworking out Machiavellian themes and Smith is working out Christian\nthemes. [Now, I am aware that there is a reading of DUNE that sees it\nas a wonderful affirmation of Islam--not to detract from those who\nbelieve this, still I remain sceptical, due to the Machiavellian\nfocus of much of Herbert's work.])\n\n=mantis=\n\nQuestions or problems to whorl-owner at lists.best.com" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Questions or problems to whorl-owner at lists.best.com" } ] } ] }