Antechamber, Jonas, navigator

Peter Stephenson · 12 Jun 1999, 11:29 · from urth-v0027.mbox · original

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From: Peter Stephenson <pws at ibmth.df.unipi.it>
Subject: Re: (urth) Re: Antechamber, Jonas, navigator
Date: Sat, 12 Jun 1999 13:29:21 +0200
Message-ID: <urth-v0027-0084 at digest.urth.net>
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"Roy C. Lackey" wrote:
>     I think the all-too-human tendency to anthropomorphize is evident both
> in Wolfe's writing about Jonas and our speculations about him. Ascribing
> human emotions such as "shock", "agitation", loyalty, love, friendship,
> loss, etc. to an android are misplaced.

I don't think it can be that simple.  As someone was saying just earlier in
the week, Wolfe writes about non-humans as if they have `souls' in some
sense.  They're not completely human --- but they're not completely inhuman
either, just like Jonas himself.  There is no such stark distinction in
Wolfe's writing.  (And androids *are* anthropomorphic; another of those
cases of the literal and metaphoric being mixed which makes Wolfe so rich.)

corncrake

*More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/

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