Standard Wolfean Riddle

Gerry Quinn · 16 Aug 2010, 16:20 · from 2010-August.txt.gz

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From: gerryq at indigo.ie (Gerry Quinn)
Date: Mon, 16 Aug 2010 17:20:25 +0100
Subject: (urth) Standard Wolfean Riddle
References: <SNT123-W6197C26BEFD9A437D4C725CF980 at phx.gbl>	<4C65544B.7080301 at gmail.com>	<0542F1EE-1D99-4671-9E9E-B80B19CF8C11 at liftingfaces.com>	<4C658AD6.5020902 at verizon.net><4C65A642.4090900 at gmail.com>	<4C6741B7.70908 at gmail.com><4C6925B9.50009 at verizon.net>	<4C693AA0.4090309 at gmail.com>	<C13CF7F0-454B-49B4-8CC7-6C39FB6B3594 at liftingfaces.com>	<4C6942CC.3070300 at gmail.com>	<DF30DAA7-4B41-4DA9-A80C-5FCD31955348 at liftingfaces.com>	<4C69473C.7030309 at gmail.com><8674746F-59B2-4B63-B975-D7595B97F818 at liftingfaces.com><4C695327.4030407 at gmail.com>
	<50144B84-4F99-4675-8D37-55781FAAC37C at liftingfaces.com>
Message-ID: <02D279C5C8154FF38A595E9711D5B783@jill>

From: "Ryan Dunn" <ryan at liftingfaces.com>

> - Gene doesn't provide dates, and neither does Severian. They certainly 
> don't provide dates representing the distance from our real Earth. Do we 
> assume that a painting of a moon man will live in a picture gallery for 
> tens of thousands of years, but a painting of Jesus Christ would not? Or 
> that a spaceship from the 1960's would still be standing and inhabited by 
> a Guild of Torturers tens of thousands of years into the future?

The spacecraft are not from the '60s.    As for the picture, there may be 
many pictures of Jesus, for all we know.

>> Christ is supposed to come back in the end, why wouldn't his name come up
>> even once in any of the five volumes set in this world?
>
> That's a good point. He certainly vanished from common knowledge - as did
> ebrtything that pertains to our history, even though bits are there as a
> vague memory.

> - See below regarding vague memories and the use of ancient Saint names. 
> By that logic, there should be a character in the text named Jesus, in 
> honor of the savior who forgave all of humanity for their sins on the 
> orders of his Father, the Increate.

Ah Lah is mentioned in BotLS, as "a forgotten god, perhaps another name for 
the Outsider".

>> We get plenty of Saint names.
>
> Not even one. The only memory of a saint that we get is Holy Katharine. I
> see no St Dorcas in the text.

> - Even more to my point. These saint names are used, however obscure they 
> might be. And yet you claim that the Urthian society has long since 
> forgotten the name of Jesus? Most of the Catholics I know wouldn't know 
> half the saint names Wolfe uses in his text.

In Ireland people are often named after saints, but never after Jesus.

- Gerry Quinn

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