Urth-Earth links

Gerry Quinn · 19 Oct 2011, 12:16 · from 2011-October.txt.gz

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From: gerry at bindweed.com (Gerry Quinn)
Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2011 13:16:50 +0100
Subject: (urth) Urth-Earth links
In-Reply-To: <SNT123-W200B01557FEBF24E4E207FCFE50 at phx.gbl>
References: <SNT123-W200B01557FEBF24E4E207FCFE50 at phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <B34F4DAB26A24F7C8086E455662BC11F@Rover>

From: Lee Berman 
> >larry miller: 

> > It was always my understanding that there were many alien 
> >beings on Urth and part of Severians unreliability as narrator was his 
> >inability to distinguish them from other beings.

> Yes, but I think the question is whether these aliens are entirely a product
> of evolution on other planets or whether they are humans who left Urth in
> earlier waves, mutated, evolved and are now returned.

You suggested earlier that Wolfe indicated this somewhere in _Urth_.  Have you a link to this? 

> >Marc Aramini: I think the Vanished People and the inhumi are man and their 
> >modifications of themselves. Tree genetic template + mankind = vanished people, 
> >etc.  The tree integration is simply a modification of man and the lower animals.
> >But that's just me I guess.

> I think the model makes sense. The thing is, if this story is going to retain a
> semblance of Judeo-Christian relevance, I think a human occupied universe makes
> some sense. Nobody really wants a green blob or crystalline structure Jesus 
> (well at least not Gene Wolfe, I guess).

I don?t see why not.  Wolfe?s aliens are often humanoid, but by no means always, and in many of his stories (certainly including the Urth cycle) he indicates that robots and androids as pretty much equivalent to people, and often morally superior.   Even if all the aliens in the stories evolved from humans (and I personally think it?s pretty clear that they did not) the robots and androids obviously cannot have.  A robot Jesus is not part of the Solar Cycle, obviously, but the concept would sit better with it than with most SF novels, crystalline structure or no.

- Gerry Quinn
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