Horn's ability

David Stockhoff · 27 Oct 2011, 15:52 · from 2011-October.txt.gz

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From: dstockhoff at verizon.net (David Stockhoff)
Date: Thu, 27 Oct 2011 11:52:54 -0400
Subject: (urth) Horn's ability
In-Reply-To: <4EA977E2.1010207 at gmail.com>
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	<4EA977E2.1010207 at gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4EA97E56.7020103 at verizon.net>

On 10/27/2011 11:25 AM, James Wynn wrote:
>
> Here's the deal. The five books of Severian, and the four books of 
> Silk (and perhaps the Book of the Short Sun although Wolfe veers into 
> very Orthodox territory there, I think) are so ingrained with 
> Gnosticism that it would be difficult to refute the assertion that 
> these books are to Gnosticism what the Chronicles of Narnia are to 
> Protestant orthodoxy. I'm not saying I'm comfortable with that 
> argument, but it would be very  difficult to refute it.
>
> Admittedly, it's possible to make too much of it. Wolfe has said that 
> Briah, Yesod, and the names of the other universes freely ripped from 
> the Gnostic lexicon without too much care for theological precision. 
> However, I think it is a mistake to assume that the saint names were 
> chose haphazardly for the characters. Given the deep level of Gnostic 
> detail carved into these books, it is extremely likely that the saint 
> name Hethor was settled on precisely BECAUSE it was also the name of a 
> Gnostic angel (an Astra, ie. "star", that is a "fallen star", that is 
> a "fallen angel" ). And it would be very like Wolfe to craft a 
> character that refers to both of those etymologies...as well as others 
> such as "Hector" or the English primrose variety known as the "Hethor 
> Giant".

Absolutely---I think the reference is simply meant to be suggestive.

Now what do you know about primroses?!?!?    :D

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