This week in Google alerts

Lee Berman · 04 Nov 2011, 17:06 · from 2011-November.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Fri, 4 Nov 2011 13:06:20 -0400
Subject: (urth) This week  in Google alerts
Message-ID: <SNT123-W3944B1093A3A54057F5AD8CFDA0 at phx.gbl>

>Gerry Quinn: Some woodland god who shares one syllable and no etymology with the 
>English word silver, and has at best a tenuous connection with Dionysus.  Of course 
>that must be the explanation!  Why worry about the quite plausible derivation of 
>Silent Silk and Silver Silk (for a single god, not two) that Wolfe gives us in the text?

That is quite a sarcastic and bitter post Gerry. Why? Discussing the mythological under-
pinnings of this story does not undercut nor debase your view of the story in any way.

You have admitted grasping that Bird-of-the-Woods is a reference to Rhea Silvia, even though
that Rhea has nothing to do with a bird. Why does silver for silvanus bother you so?

Anyway, Wolfe has Hound explain that "Silk has been awarded the epithet Silent.." because
he looked out of the Sacred Windows without showing himself or speaking or making the window
change in any way.

So how does that explain the epithet Silver? It would seem Wolfe's Hound's (heh) explanation
for "Silent Silk or Silver Silk" is lacking by 50% wouldn't you agree? Why did Wolfe even
mention "Silver Silk" if he only meant the "silent" explantation to have significance?

If ignoring Silver Silk works for you, that's completely fine. But why does it bother you when 
others find plausible explanations, such as invoking the Silenus and Silvanus epithets of 
Dionysus? Wolfe mentions and explicitly explains "epithets" in this section. He pointedly 
refrences Dionysus in a nearby section of the story. You don't have to connect them but why huff 
and fume when others do? It is in the text.

>I see a problem when a continual torrent of supposed ?levels? are proposed by readers who don?t 
>appear to recognise the need for or even validity of any methodology for assessing the 
>difference between a genuine correspondence or some spurious ?link? dreamt up out of random noise 
>while trying to confirm some other highly questionable theory.

You see a problem for who?

Is it the "torrent" which bothers you so much? Perhaps I understand this. Who couldn't empathize 
with the chagrin of the Dutch boy who has been diligently plugging dike leaks only to get hit by a 
tsunami? So from a human to human perspective, you have my understanding.

But I'm not clear on what your "valid methodology" for understanding this work of literature is.
Is it possible for you to explain it? It can't rely on the old humdrum of "what's in the text".

It has been demonstrated over and over, including in my example above, that everyone, theorists
and skeptics alike, are selective in parsing out portions of the text and paying attention to
and quoting only those parts which support a particular view. Let's be honest, Gerrry, ignoring
the Silver Silk part of the mystery above is not the first time you've done it nor is this the
first time it has been pointed out to you that you do it. How is your methodology in any way 
superior to anyone else's?

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