symbols, motifs, and extra textual relevance vs. onomastic onanism

Gerry Quinn · 28 Mar 2013, 15:04 · from 2013-March.txt.gz

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From: gerry at bindweed.com (Gerry Quinn)
Date: Thu, 28 Mar 2013 15:04:11 -0000
Subject: (urth) symbols, motifs,
	and extra textual relevance vs. onomastic onanism
In-Reply-To: <1364399312.28116.YahooMailClassic at web160706.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>
References: <1364399312.28116.YahooMailClassic at web160706.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>
Message-ID: <357161C7C73241429A84D3ABE8812614@Rover>

From: Marc Aramini
--- On Wed, 3/27/13, Gerry Quinn <gerry at bindweed.com> wrote:

> > Sandwalker's 'tree' grows large when he sleeps with Seven Girls Waiting.
> > The Marshmen steal boy children from the Hillmen and castrate them to
> > make their shamans (as Sweetmouth notices in the pit), and they do not
> > grow beards.  The talk of trees is essentially myth and wordplay [*].

> This is where we vary the most - I think the tree allusion to his genitals 
> is
> the distraction away from their other form of reproduction, this one we 
> are
> mechanistically familiar with as readers, a metaphor in use because there
> is more than one way to inseminate an abo, skin a cat, or what have you.

Doesn't that multiply entities unnecessarily?  The abos have gender, sex, 
childbirth and hormonal systems akin to ours.  Sandwalker says he is a man 
in part because he has known woman - he does not mention trees - nor is he 
baffled by the Shadow Childrens' 'wife' metaphor for their drug.  What 
evidence or need is there for a secondary system of reproduction?  David 
says they mated with trees, but how would he distinguish myth from reality? 
All he knows of abos is vague tales.  VRT's knowledge is more authoritative. 
At no time in his story does anyone actually mate with a tree.

[*] And, I should perhaps have added, abo sexual politics.

- Gerry Quinn

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