{
  "export": {
    "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/whorl/798",
    "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'"
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  "archive": "whorl",
  "thread": {
    "id": 798,
    "subject": "A defense of the Long Sun's style/plot",
    "messages": 1,
    "voices": 1,
    "first": "2000-04-01T23:29:47+00:00",
    "last": "2000-04-01T23:29:47+00:00"
  },
  "messages": [
    {
      "message_id": "<whorl-v0010-0285@digest.urth.net>",
      "from": {
        "name": "Patri10629",
        "address": "patri10629 at aol.com"
      },
      "date": "2000-04-01T23:29:47+00:00",
      "subject": "Re: (whorl) A defense of the Long Sun's style/plot",
      "in_reply_to": null,
      "reply_link": null,
      "blocks": [
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "In a message dated 4/1/00 4:27:08 PM, akt at attglobal.net writes:\n\n<< \nBjjp2 then wrote, responding to Timothy Reilly:"
        },
        {
          "kind": "quote",
          "depth": 1,
          "text": " I still think Long Sun is very disappointing.  The third person style of >  diction chosen is flat and to my mind rather boring, anaesthetising >  Wolfe's linguistic genius (so on display in OBW and TBNS).  The ideas, >  while interesting, did not require four volumes to present.  As for the >  meticulous plotting suggested by Alice Turner, I can only say this was >  not evident to me -  on the contrary I had the impression that unlike >  TBNS the series was not fully written in advance, if only because Exodus >  is twice as long as the three preceding volumes.>>"
        },
        {
          "kind": "text",
          "depth": 0,
          "text": "Two things:\n\nIn terms of plotting: I, too, had difficulties with the Talus factory scene. \nBut bear with me and check this out.\n\nEarly in NIGHTSIDE... Silk has cracked the book at random and is interpreting \ntwo passages from Chrasmologic Writings for the children in the church. They \nhave to do with birds. This is right before Oreb's botched sacrifice and \nright after his pruchase. Notice how Wolfe's draws our attention to that \nfact, even though he is not talking about Oreb at all.\n\nP. 49,  NLS  \"...when the actors and actresses  have washed away their makeup \nand changed back into the clothing they ordinarily wear...\"\n\nAnd then...\n\nP. 49-50  NLS \"It will not help us as the foreknowing authors point out in \nthe next line, to daub a raven, smearing a blackbird with the delicate \nbeauties of the lark or the decent brown of the bulbul. Not enough, even, to \ngild it like the goldfinch. It is still a raven...\"\n\nAnd then...\n\nP. 50 (IBID) \"Suppose, for example, that some uneducated man...were by chance \nthrust into the office of His Cognizance, the Polocutor. You would eat and \nsleep in his cognizance's big palace on the Palatine. You would hold the \nbaculus and wear the jeweled robes, and all the rest of us would kneel for \nyour blessing. But you could not provide us with the wisdom that it would be \nyour duty to supply. You would be a croaking raven daubed with paint, with \ngaudy colors.\"\n\nHe is talking about Questzal. A figure who will not be revealed until 600 \nsome pages later. In the opening chapter of Calde of The Long Sun where he \ndabs on his makeup and flies away.\n\nYou do not get things like this in dashed-off first drafts. This is the mind \nof an master builder or an engineer--\"a foreknowing author\" as he slyly and \nself-consciouly admits in the text--laying foundations that will not \nevidently bear weight until much later. And, still, this foreshadowing of the \nimpersonating inhumi is only one level of what Wolfe is doing in these early, \nseemingly innocent pasages.\n\nIn terms of style: This is his method throughout the Long Sun Books. \nDeception. Thusly the prose reflects the major themes and thrust of the \nnovels: Cutting through the crap to understand the mysterious revelation of \nan unknowable true god as well as the underlying conspiracies and strategems \nof mortals and false gods. Deceptively transparent prose which is so clear \nand narratively propulsive it seems to be what it appears to be. It is not. \nIt is some of the densest, metaphor-laden and trickiest prose I have ever \nread. And it is beautiful on any level, in my opinion. Try reading any \npassage aloud and marvel at the music. \n\nFor further proof: Re-read the very first two pages of NIGHTSIDE--so simple, \nso plain--read right to the first line of dialogue \"I will not fail.\" Try \ndecoding just how many motifs are buried there. In many ways, Wolfe has given \nthe shape and structure of the whole saga. He even mentions Blue and Green.  \nTalk about foreshadowing!\n\nMost of this stuff I didn't get until my third read. I'm on my fifth now and \nI'm still discovering, still captivated. Severian's beautiful grave poetry \nwas a different kettle of fish. This is airier stuff, wind-made, bird \ncurrents, but jsut as strong--and like the wind, you can only see it when it \ninteracts with something that crosses its path. Indirectly, that is.\n\nHope this helps.\n\nPatrick O'Leary\n\n\n*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun."
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}