Short Sun blog

Lee Berman · 23 Sep 2010, 14:35 · from 2010-September.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2010 10:35:17 -0400
Subject: (urth) Short Sun blog
Message-ID: <SNT123-W1164635028B77C642B549FCF610 at phx.gbl>

>Gerry Quinn: Not a strong 'Spring' association.  And if we lose the 'typhoon' 
>association, the wind connection is even weaker.

Agreed. But if the sirrocco winds of Typhon-Set were a spring-only phenomenon my 
skepticism on this theory would be significantly erased. Typhon-Set was a god of
wind. 

>The drought (as well as any unexpectedly hot winds) is a consequence of the 
>blockage of some of the Whorl's ventilation tunnels over time; it is an 
>indication of the decrepitude of the Whorl.  The Whorl as built by 
>Pas/Typhon did not suffer from drought.

There are some who feel the Whorl's failures are the result of planned obsolescence.
i.e. Typhon/Pas wanted it to fail to discourage the residents from staying on. (FWIW-
the Babylonian cognate to Typhon, Pazuzu, was also a god/demon of winds. I suspect this
is at least a partial inspiration for the name "Pas")

>If there were strong associations between Spring Wind and Typhon, such as a suggestion of 
>two heads, I'd credit it.  But I think it's a stretch to read an identification into what 
>we see here.

Surely it is a stretch. But many think that stretching one's intuition is necessary to 
understand these stories. If all the implied associations were strong, obvious ones, it 
wouldn't be a Gene Wolfe book.

On the other hand, guarding against over-stretching is surely also a necessary function of 
understanding. Finding a balance is the reason we are here, is it not?  Happily the 
decision on where to draw the line is quite individualized for each person and for each
Wolfe mystery.

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