House of Ancestors

Greg Bates · 25 May 2008, 07:02 · from 2008-May.txt.gz

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From: tedkennedyrolls at gmail.com (Greg Bates)
Date: Sun, 25 May 2008 03:02:33 -0400
Subject: (urth) House of Ancestors
Message-ID: <81c420fa0805250002i439ad37ajf423a521c8a2482e at mail.gmail.com>

I've been reading through the Endangered Species short story collection
(about halfway through so far and loving it), and I just tripped over this
story. The other couple of stories i've read that I wanted some
clarification on the "twist" from, like "Kevin Malone", have been discussed
pretty extensively, but this one hasn't gotten any mentions. Couple things
i'm trying to figure out:

1) Is the "Joe" in the last paragraph of the story actually Joe, or a robot
created by the Thing? I get this impression from the last sentence of the
story in which Joe remembers that his girlfriend is pregnant. Earlier on,
we're told that anyone who enters the Thing gets "a segment" of their
genetic code read and an extrapolated ancestor as their guide created from
the DNA sample. So at first, I figured "Joe" is a creation of his unborn
child's DNA created by the Thing, except that your clone mimics you at the
time of your conception, ergo Joe wouldn't be talking about getting the nail
removed from his heart. So now i'm confused again. What's the significance
of having a protagonist with a nail in his chest anyway? It's clear Wolfe
never adds a detail for no reason.

2) What's the significance of the paragraph in italics at the beginning? It
describes two people looking through the fair's telescope (presumably at the
top globe of the Thing where the climax of the story takes place), one right
before and one right after the climax. However, isn't the fair supposed to
be deserted, none of the exhibits open? Are the woman and the man characters
from the party Joe is with? What the hell does it mean?

Other than that, i'm loving Endangered Species, especially the New Sun
universe stories, "Thag" and "Ming the Merciless".

Greg
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