Silk or Horn?

Lee Berman · 30 Aug 2013, 12:02 · from 2013-August.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Fri, 30 Aug 2013 08:02:20 -0400
Subject: (urth) Silk or Horn?
Message-ID: <BLU175-W38AEF49CF6515F40B97C78CF350 at phx.gbl>

>Marc Aramini: Nettle knows that the man who has come back is not her husband 
>anymore.

>Antonio Pedro Marques: That I do not know. They know he isn't Horn because his 
>body is Silk's and his personality likewise - in fact the only reason he can 
>get anyone to entertain him as Horn is because he has all of Horn's memories.

My first reaction was to disagree with Marc; to say that he is still Horn, in
part. But then I noticed Marc didn't phrase it like that. He says the guy is
"not her husband anymore".  An interesting distinction. After all he has been 
through, is Silkhorn still Nettle's husband?

There is a scene in RttW where the narrator is sitting at a table with Mint,
Bison and others, describing his quest to find Silk. They are all trying to 
be very polite and considerate of his feelings by not pointing out the fact 
that Silk is sitting at the table with them.

Finally he gets frustrated with their condescension and says something like,
"Look, I know you all think I am Silk. I know I look like Silk. But I'm not
Silk. I'm Horn. Nobody can tell a man he is not who he knows himself to be".

I find this to be a powerful passage and not one to be dismissed merely as
the ranting of a delusional guy. We all know that identity, especially self-
identity is an important theme across all Wolfe's works.

Horn is very much a middle aged man. There is discussion of his growing 
stockiness and baldness. There is just a hint of world-weariness. He has the 
"midlife crisis" need to balance being a husband and father with a need for
adventure and conflict, Seawrack and a harem, etc.

Wolfe was nearing 70 as he wrote Short Sun. Perhaps the confusion of Horn and
Silk serves as a metaphor for the struggle of transition from paunchy middle-aged 
guy to a less passionate, white-haired, wise, elder man. When do you break down
and admit fully and completely to being "old"?  Ever?

(for some reason I am reminded of a recent news story from Florida, where a 72 
year old guy went on a rampage, shooting a bunch of people including his 80
year old former boss and former best friend)

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