From Sieur Borski:
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alga then continuing:
<This may well be true in "The Night Chough," which only you and mantis seem to have read. But there's not a tweak of evidence for it in the five books we have all read. Scylla has apparently been there (for the story), done that and skedaddled.>
I'm curious, alga, if you have any thoughts about why then in GREEN's Proper Names In The Text, Wolfe parenthetically includes information about how Scylla is "also a sea-monster of the Red Sea Whorl"--since it doesn't seem to play (selon toi) a part in the Green narrative at all. Also curious if you're still holding to your Mother-as-undine theory, and how you fit undines into the Short Sun weltanschauung.
The Red Sun Whorl is, of course, Urth. And if Urth is Earth in any way Scylla is indeed a sea-monster of ancient mythology. But I have no idea why wicked Mr. Wolfe identified her that way and I agree that it seems left fieldish. I had forgotten that I ever advanced the Mother-as-undine theory--you have a good memory! No, I don't hold to it now; the Mother seems rather more complicated than an undine. I wonder if we will ever know more about her--perhaps not. There are some equally mysterious Mothers in German mythology that continue to baffle.
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Falcon then ruminating:
<Just because Oreb sees Scylla in the lake and another person sees Scylla walking beside Oreb and someone else doesn't prove that Oreb is being ridden by Scylla. What we see of Scylla, for example when she rides Chenille, is a personality that exhibits vicious and bloodthirsty characteristics utterly foreign to Oreb's character. [snip] A Scylla-ridden Oreb would be a much different, and less likable and wise, bird.>
Oreb, in "The Night Chough," is a somewhat more sinister figure, even going so far as to suggest which weapons Starling use to avenge the murder of his girlfriend. Then again, the murderers (who also sexually assault Lily)
are
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hardly sympathetic figures. (Hurry up, Kevin M. and reread the story.
Surely
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others on the list have read TNC?)
I suppose Wombat will take me to task for copyright violation if I publically wonder if anyone could be persuaded to photocopy this story and pass it out to those interested. (In fact, Wombat, it's not a violation if it's for private use.) If someone sent ME a copy, I would gladly act as a conduit just so we could all figure out what we're talking about here.
-alga
*This is WHORL, for discussion of Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun.