Weekly blog links

Jonathan Goodwin · 14 Apr 2009, 16:46 · from 2009-April.txt.gz

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From: joncgoodwin at gmail.com (Jonathan Goodwin)
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 2009 11:46:53 -0500
Subject: (urth) Weekly blog links
In-Reply-To: <49E4B3CF.2010205 at colby.edu>
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I agree with you about "The Ziggurat," but I also think _There Are
Doors_ is a much better book than the two most recent novels. I also
don't think that Pandora or Castleview is encumbered by unnecessary
(or, "inorganic") Wolfeanism in the way I thought AEG or PF was, which
would fit the audience/editorial expectation hypothesis.

2009/4/14 "Fernando Q. Gouv?a" <fqgouvea at colby.edu>:
> Well, I don't know. I remember when reviewers used to complain that Wolfe
> was too difficult (for example, an infamous review by Orson Scott Card).
> There's no doubt he reacted to that and tried to be more accessible at
> times. For me, however, it's not a matter of decline over time, but of
> variability. No author can hit the jackpot always. Fifth Head, Peace, New
> Sun were roughly contemporaneous, after all, with Devil in a Forest, Free
> Live Free, There Are Doors, Castleview.
>
> To my taste, Castleview and Pandora are distinctly weaker than Pirate
> Freedom or An Evil Guest.
>
> Similarly with the shorter work. Wolfe seems to have weighted his "Best"
> volume heavily towards the older stuff, but I'm not convinced that the newer
> stories are not as good. Different, certainly. But "Ziggurat", say, is as
> good a story as "The Death of Doctor Island", and perhaps better. For one
> thing, it's far more complex morally.
>
> Fernando
>
>>> How many of you agree that the Wolfe of Fifth Head, Peace, New Sun,
>>> Endangered Species (partially), and Death of Dr. Island and OS and OS
>>> is not even recognizably the same author as that of Pirate Freedom, An
>>> Evil Guest, or the Short Sun? (Shared concerns, yes. The quality of
>>> execution, however, is more like that of a bad imitator.)
>
> --
> =============================================================
> Fernando Q. Gouvea ? ? ? ? ? ? Carter Professor of Mathematics ? Colby
> College ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Editor, MAA FOCUS
> 5836 Mayflower Hill ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Editor, MAA Reviews
> Waterville, ME 04901 ? ? ? ? ? ? ?http://mathdl.maa.org/mathDL/19/
> http://www.colby.edu/~fqgouvea
>
> What makes the universe so hard to comprehend is that there's nothing to
> compare it with.
>
>
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