time bending headache

maa32 · 09 Apr 2002, 17:21 · from urth-v0204.mbox · original

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From: maa32 <maa32 at dana.ucc.nau.edu>
Subject: (urth) time bending headache
Date: Tue, 09 Apr 2002 10:21:43 -0700
Message-ID: <urth-v0204-568 at digest.urth.net>
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I (half in levity, I admit) yesterday said something about sending horn a y=
ear=20
into the past into Silk's body to finish up the healing, possibly leaving h=
is=20
home on Blue and Silk's home at the same time.  This gave me such a headach=
e=20
that I got sick thinking about it: if Horn is transplanted into Babbie, the=
n=20
Horn can possibly be helping himself on the boat in Babbie, and he can see =
his=20
own intelligence in the eyes of the beast.  The headache was only beginning=
. =20
Could Horn/Silk be writing about the things that happened to Horn as they=20
happened, or even slightly before?  ARGH.  That damn two year comment=20
destroyed my life - and I've wondered about it before. =20
On the con side of this (meaning it MIGHT just be a typo) is the following=20
from In Green's Jungles: "'How long has your father been gone?'
About three ... Did you hear that, sir?'" (pg 407 SFBC BOTSS, toward the en=
d=20
of Chapter 19 IGJ)
How long does it take Silk to get from that point to Horn's home at last?  =
A=20
long time?  What could Hide be saying besides three years?  Why did he get =
cut=20
short?  Is it an important ommision?  Three months?  Three half years?  Thr=
ee=20
and many moons ago? Could it really be a typo about the two year business? =20
The idea that Horn is in two places at once at least reconciles one argumen=
t=20
against him being in Babbie: that he was already riding a beast with three=20
horns when he died (or was injured mortally) on Green. (incidentally, a=20
literal beast we never see at all - he is on a lander). But it makes me sic=
k=20
to think about that.

That makes the book much too vertiginous for me.  It really puts a new=20
relationship between the random stuff Silk/Horn writes down and his confuse=
d=20
and jumbled attempt at explaining a quest that may be contiguous with the t=
ime=20
of composition.  It might be better just to ignore this clue in order to sl=
eep=20
OK at night.
This almost achieves the same disorientation for me as 7 american nights or=20
the end of A Story in the Fifth Head of Cerberus. =20
Marc Aramini

--=20

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