The Devil in a Forest

David Stockhoff · 16 May 2009, 13:13 · from 2009-May.txt.gz

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From: dstockhoff at verizon.net (David Stockhoff)
Date: Sat, 16 May 2009 09:13:11 -0400
Subject: (urth)  The Devil in a Forest
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I don't recall the novel well, but I'm skeptical that one can so confidently read direct criticism of socialism and bureaucratic government in it. They are modern ideas that may be roughly linked but can't actually be represented in this milieu. Naturally Wolfe doesn't like them, because they are inferior to the rule of a good king. So I'd like to see more citations specifically supporting that theory. Unless, of course, you meant it only in a general or indirect sense.

First of all, by the time you've equated socialism with "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor," you've already hanged socialism without a trial, because that means you don't know what it is. Though I will grant that it is commonly understood in that way in the US, and that the requirement of ignorance does not rule out Wolfe's understanding it that way too.

Second, in what way does a feudal figure resemble modern big government? Again, punitive overtaxing---a practice that was perfected by the Medicis, not by the IRS, by any stretch---and being corrupt and evil bears no particular relation to big government as we know it. Rather, it's business as usual for imperial/authoritarian orders of the kind our big government replaced. 

If anything, the story sets---if I can again put it in the terms of past debates---'good' king vs 'bad' king. Bad kings tax and kill freely and destroy all that is not theirs; good kings try to improve things but also tax and kill with restraint. Nobility should behave in a certain way, according to a code, as a knight. Neither the sheriff nor Wat is a nobleman, and thus cannot be either. Clearly Wat is misguided, but it wouldn't be the first time a Wolfe protagonist is misguided.

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Message: 4
Date: Fri, 15 May 2009 08:31:57 -0500
From: "James Wynn" <crushtv at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: (urth) The Devil in a Forest
To: "The Urth Mailing List" <urth at lists.urth.net>
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> > Don Doggett:
> >Sorry James, I've read The Devil in a Forest,
>   
 >but I was pretty underwhelmed by it, so I never dug very deep.

Look, this is no great work, but it is a very "well-constructed" work; to a 
degree that it's worth examining for that reason alone. Most people are 
unaware of the story of the evil abbess who poisons, blinds, and kills Robin 
Hood. Wolfe has combined the abbess, Baba Yaga, and Hansel & Gretel's witch 
into a single character.

The story has lots of interesting, filled-out characters. The abbe' is an 
early Silk as well as a kind of Friar Tuck.

Thematically Wat/Robin Hood is an interesting exemplar of the corrupting 
nature of socialism while the Ganelon/Sherriff of Nottingham is an exemplar 
of the ambiguous but cruel nature of big, bureaucratic government.

I've read much worse novels, even by Wolfe.

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