5HC

Lee · 04 Sep 2014, 14:39 · from 2014-September.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee)
Date: Thu, 4 Sep 2014 10:39:46 -0400
Subject: (urth) 5HC
Message-ID: <BLU175-W3704F3FFE7A79D2FEE8EECFC50 at phx.gbl>

>Jeff Wilson: Could it be that some other spacefaring race brings 

>imitators from St Anne to Earth during the time of the Homeric Greeks, 

>where they infiltrate as feys and elfs then are assimilated? The other 

>spacers could return to St Anne with humans who are imitated and 

>assimilated, setting the stage for the French explorers to land 4 000 years 

>later?

Yes, I very much think a scenario like this is hinted at. Partly because we

see a similar scenario described in BotNS with human (instead of Shadows)

spreading out across the galaxy, evolving then returning to the home planet

as aliens.

Also because it adds the final level of horror to the story I think Wolfe 

intended. When I first read 5HoC it was the novella only and I, like Gerry,

considered Veil's Hypothesis to be a silliness which served only as an 

oblique plot device, allowing Number Five to chase Dr. Marsch away.

Later, in reading the full novel, as it dawned on me in reading V.R.T. that

victor had replaced Marsch, the greater level of horror became apparent as

I remembered back to Veil's Hypothesis and realized it wasn't just a one

person replacement that was being hinted at.

Then, on re-reading, an even deeper horror is revealed in the talk of the 

Shadow Children; the idea that we on earth have long been infected/corrupted

compromised by this extra-terrestrial presence. 

That's how I see it, anyway and I even see this sort of alien corruption as the 

criterion for Urth's need to be cleansed in BotNS (in parallel to the Biblical 

cleansing of earth in Noah's time).

Jeff, a while back you asked me if I saw the Inhumi as a commentary on the sort

of people here on earth who become a part of families and/or communities and 

parasitically suck them dry as a part of their infiltration. I emphatically 

answered affirmatively. I find pretty much all of Wolfe's work to be social

commentary. Even a book full of futuristic torturers, giants, monsters and 

wizardry ends up as a commentary on our own religious/mythological past.

>Antonio Pedro Marques: And he's not the kind of writer, either, to put on some 

>random stuff in his books about, say, colonialism, and leave it at that....I can't 

>accept that FHC simply 'broaches' the thematic of colonialism, rather I expect it 

>to make some concrete statements about it.

I also agree with Antonio. I find Gene Wolfe to be more of a portrait artist who

focuses on his subject without a large amount of attention to non-plot/character

related landscape elements. I also find him to be a person of strong opinions on 

topics such as society, religion, culture, etc. who is loathe to slap his readers 

across the face with those opinions. I don't always agree with those opinions but 

I absolutely love and admire the way he manages to blend those opinions in between 

the lines of his stories.

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