Losing Imitation

James Wynn · 29 Dec 2010, 20:37 · from 2010-December.txt.gz

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From: crushtv at gmail.com (James Wynn)
Date: Wed, 29 Dec 2010 14:37:52 -0600
Subject: (urth) Losing Imitation
In-Reply-To: <SNT123-W65600BD7E7EECC3BE9625CCF020 at phx.gbl>
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Message-ID: <4D1B9C20.9090703 at gmail.com>

> (when the question comes up of why the Whorl was sent to Blue/Green all I've ever seen are shrugs)

In fairness, that's what Wolfe did when asked why the Whorl was sent.
He also said Typhon didn't know about the inhumi, and they weren't part 
of /his/ plan.

> When you say the inhumi "really are human" in dream travel,
> what does that mean? That they show the human form of someone
> they have bitten? I can't really understand any other meaning. These things are really vampires or reptiles or vines or white worms.

Their bodies are reptilian vampires. Their souls are human. Pas and his 
family are human in this regard as well...not in the eyes of God 
perhaps...but in every other way. At least the way, Wolfe sees it.

It true that inhumi in dream-travel tend to be promiscuous. But that is 
because their plight is like that of the chems...human souls trapped in 
inhuman corporeal forms (and that is exactly what I think the chems 
are). When they get their human (okay, human-ish) bodies, they want to 
use them. They want to be loved by humans. It's the Pinocchio story 
again. Its like the giants in The Wizard Knight. (It true these bodies 
don't need to eat, but they can be killed in the conventional ways, so I 
presume if you cut them open, you would find human organs.)

The Rajan says they are truly human. Perhaps he is prejudiced by his 
memory of Hyacinth. But he is the best authority we have on this 
subject, so I am inclined to believe him. He also says that sex with 
them is wrong. And perhaps that is Silk talking (he did speak of a 
"taint" between them that doesn't come from either of them).

>
> (FWIW, Dracula author Bram Stoker also wrote Lair Of the White Worm. I don't think the vampire connection
> is coincidental)

Perhaps, but Wolfe has denied any physical connection between Green/Blue 
and St Anne/St Croix. But Wolfe might have had some thought of that 
somewhere in the mix as well.

>
> By analogy I must guess that the Shadow Children appear human to those
> humans they contacted via dreams. Perhaps it is redundant to note that
> both the locals from Ste. Anne and the locals from Green are pretty bad
> at using tools.

Well, twins share dreams, so it is not unlikely that they contact other 
entities through dreams. But I'd want evidence that they APPEAR in dreams.

I don't think I'd draw so close a correlation between Fifth Head and 
Short Sun. Wolfe is reusing parts, but I don't think the 
Neighbors/Inhumi are Shadow Children/abos. Only in part because I think 
the abos ARE Shadow Children. I just think Sandwalker and the psychic 
tribe he meets in the pit are descended from different waves of human 
colonization.

u+16b9
>

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