The Riverman

brunians at brunians.org · 02 May 2010, 20:02 · from 2010-May.txt.gz

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From: brunians at brunians.org (brunians at brunians.org)
Date: Sun, 2 May 2010 16:02:19 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: (urth) The Riverman
In-Reply-To: <006401caea30$ab42ec20$66cd4a0c@rclackey>
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Message-ID: <5847.72.171.0.141.1272830539.squirrel at brunians.org>

It's not Wolfe's catch-all notion of faerie.

It's the picture of faerie common to people who believe in such things.

.



> Craig Brewer wrote:
>> Another small point that may not be significant at all, but after the
> final showdown, Martha tells Bax: "You have seen the Riverman. ... Not
> many
> can say that." But he saw *three* hairy giants, and they emerged from the
> forest, not the river. And since we have so many other things called
> River-
> in this book (the motel, the suburban development that the Skotos Strip
> becomes), is this whole Riverman thing bigger than just another example of
> general "faerie" weirdness that Bax encounters?<
>
> I tend to think that the Riverman (or Rivermen) is just another example of
> Wolfe's catch-all notion of faerie. He did this before, in CASTLEVIEW,
> where
> there was a Big Foot-like creature (or creatures) who really had little to
> do with the Arthurian story. Also werewolves and phantom hitchhikers.
>
> -Roy
>
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