Wolfe, "Book of the New Sun"

P W Stephenson · 12 Aug 1992, 09:23 · from sf-lovers.1992.mbox

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From: pws at castle.ed.ac.uk (P W Stephenson)
Subject: Re: Wolfe, "Book of the New Sun"
Date: 12 Aug 92 09:23:30 GMT
Message-ID: <sflovers-v17-418-13 at digest.sf-lovers>
X-Digest-Issue: SF-LOVERS Digest V17 #418
X-Urthmirror-Source: https://archive.org/details/sf-lovers-digest-vol-17b

lindsay+ at cs.cmu.edu (Donald Lindsay) writes:
>Borges may have made up the historical reference that Wolfe used for
>"Baldanders".

I seem to discover something new about this book every day (and it's half a
dozen years since I first read it).  The reference to Borges brought back
something I've been wondering about for a long time: namely that all the
action takes place in the southern hemisphere (unless Wolfe intends that it
should get colder towards the equator, which might fit in with the theme of
paradox; I can't remember how strong the evidence is.)  I have assumed,
dangerously, that the Commonwealth is (some major part of) South America;
perhaps this is just because the Ascians, to the north, made me think of
ASCII, which made me think of... (etc.).  Anyway, could this (purported)
setting be an homage to the type of fiction deriving from Borges?  Just
wondered.

Oh yes... while I'm on the subject, the only direct quotation I've ever
seen (there is reference after reference after reference, of course) from
another work is from Marlowe's Faustus (roughly, ``Hell hath no limits, nor
is circumscribed...''; it occurs just before the meeting with the undine, I
think.)  Are there others?  Does the singling out of this example mean
something?  (Of course it does, unlike `singling' which looks weird.  I'm
starting to blabber.  I liked `an homage', though.)

Peter Stephenson
Dept. of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics
University of liverpool, U.K.
+44 51 794 3784 or 3791
pws at s-a.amtp.liv.ac.uk
PWS at UKACRL.BITNET

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