# Grasping Throne of Darkness *The Whorl list — 1 messages, 1 voices, 14 Feb 1997* > 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. --- ### m.driussi *14 Feb 1997, 02:50* Reply: Item #3607705 from WHORL at LISTS.BEST.COM@INET# Henry Rathvon, So when are =you= going to write a critical essay on Wolfe? I'm grinning, but I'm also serious. Go on, do it! There are pieces out there (tell me what you've read and I'll tell you any others that I know of), but there's room for much much more. You mention Borges and Nabokov, two authors whom Gene Wolfe has praised in one or two interviews (at least). Since they are among his favorite, I'm sure he would be delighted that you rank him with them. Re: getting newcomers to read Wolfe. Yes, proof positive that you can lead a horse to water but you cannot force him to drink. For a kick you might want to look up an essay by Harold Bloom (title escapes me . . . alga? Do you know it?) where he writes about his obsession with A VOYAGE TO ARCTURUS by David Lindsay. (And it is a pretty interesting book, btw.) Anyhow, he talks about reading copies to pieces (!) as well as trying to get other people to read it, and most of them having the reaction you just described happening to you. Which is why it is very important, imho, to establish the informal network between all Wolfe fans--this mailing list is a great example! Stand up and be counted, talk about what you love. Re: Wolfe isn't sf. You know, you may not be nearly as lonely in this idea as you might think. Based on the experience of selling the Lexicon, I have a developing theory that many, if not most, Wolfe fans actually read little or no sf at all. (Which seems somewhat paradoxical to me--I discovered Wolfe after reading a whole lot of Jack Vance. Then word of mouth told me about THE BOOK OF THE NEW SUN, which I had initially resisted for its s&m title and cover, and then, well . . . ) So I'm curious as to other Wolfe fans, their reading tastes (whether they read sf or not, and if not, then how on Urth did they manage to find Gene Wolfe?! He's hard enough to find as it is!), and how widespread is the idea "Gene Wolfe is not an sf writer" among Wolfe fans. alga, So based on the Pas no-show theophany, as well as the sudden and increasing powers of Tartaros toward the end, you divine that the rightful and dutiful son has ascended the throne of the Whorl? (Pas in Saturn-like retirement?) Good job! I like it. =mantis= Questions or problems to whorl-owner at lists.best.com ---