Crowley and mystery

Dave Lebling · 18 Dec 2008, 00:08 · from 2008-December.txt.gz

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From: dlebling at hyraxes.com (Dave Lebling)
Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 19:08:54 -0500
Subject: (urth) Crowley and mystery
In-Reply-To: <W5575729439170751229555983@webmail27>
References: <W5575729439170751229555983@webmail27>
Message-ID: <49499496.4000605 at hyraxes.com>

I've read all of the Jerusalem Quartet books, and Quinn's Shanghai 
Circus, which has a similar style but is more-or-less unrelated. They 
actually remind me more of Pynchon than Wolfe or Vance or Crowley, 
though it's hard to articulate why. Probably because the whole quartet 
has an overarching theme and some consistent macguffins but is mostly 
episodic. I like them, but then I like Pynchon, and Flann O'Brian, and 
other strange more-or-less modernist types. Wolfe tells stories with 
plots, but tells them obscurely. Pynchon's books, and Whittemore's, have 
plots but they are at least in my opinion secondary to the desire to 
produce effects. Wolfe is in many ways a very traditional writer on the 
surface.

Whittemore was out-of-print for a long time, but recently (the last 
couple years) his books were all republished in rather nice trade 
paperback editions.

-- Dave Lebling, aka vizcacha

Son of Witz wrote:
> anyone read Edward Whittemore's Sinai Tapestry.
> that's a strange sort of puzzle.  Odd book. One of those ones where I didn't like it until about a month later, when, not having thought about it since closing the pages, the symbols jumped out and started making sense.
> very curious work.  I'm not sure if it's scifi or not.  The cover would lead you to believe it, and many elements.  I suppose New Sun fans might find a lot worth pondering. Jerusalem, repeating Anchors in history, time paradoxes. I just found out it's the first of the Jerusalem Quartet. I suppose I should read the others.  very strange.  the blurb on the cover compared it to LOTR, which left me scratching my head big time.
> ~witz
>
>   
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Zvi Gilbert [mailto:zvi at vex.net]
>> Sent: Wednesday, December 17, 2008 02:38 PM
>> To: urth at lists.urth.net
>> Subject: (urth) Crowley and mystery
>>
>>     
>>>> It's just probably not the sort of stuff that inspires me to get online
>>>> and try to hash out what the hell is going on with some other readers.
>>>>         
>>> For that, I would recommend John Crowley, especially _Engine Summer_ and
>>> _Little, Big_.
>>>       
>> I don't find either of those books particularly confusing. Wonderful, 
>> brilliant, and exquisite, yes; but they're not New Sun-like. I suspect a 
>> discussion of it for me would devolve into quoting favorite lines and 
>> swooning.
>>
>> However, Crowley's long and complex four novel series Aegypt (The 
>> Solitudes, Love & Sleep, Daemonomania, Endless Things) is something that I 
>> would love to hash over with interested parties. As many of its 
>> characters and situations are drawn from history (John Dee, Giordano 
>> Bruno, and so forth), I would just like some particularly erudite person 
>> to lecture at me about the source material -- I suspect I would learn a 
>> lot that way.
>>
>> --Zvi
>>
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>>     
>
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