Seven American Nights

StoneOx17 · 24 May 2002, 02:16 · from urth-v0205.mbox · original

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From: StoneOx17 at aol.com
Subject: (urth) Seven American Nights
Date: Thu, 23 May 2002 22:16:41 EDT
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I think that Robert Borski has brilliantly figured out the mysteries in Sev=
en=20
American Nights.  I want to add a corroborating piece of evidence I=20
discovered, and try to answer one of the objections to his theory.

The corroborating evidence: If you count backwards from Good Friday, and=20
include the missing night, you discover that the last performance of "Visit=20
to a Small Planet" was on Sunday night, with "Mary Rose" starting on Monday=
. =20
This is the usual day that repertory theaters end a run. =20

Now, to address one of the objections to Borski's theory.  Robert Borski=20
writes:

> ("I would therefore like to suggest something else to you. Is it possible=20
that=20
> what Nadan actually notices by the ignited arrack is the burn caused by=20
> his own laser pistol and that Ardis Dahl is the werebeast he attempts, but
> fails, to kill on the night of the first egg?")

David DiGiacomo objects:

> "No, it's not possible, because..."
> "If he had seen the laser burn, it would have been obvious beyond any=20
> plausible dissociation that he had *not* killed the thing earlier in the
> week.

Robert Borski replies:

> "What, you expect lucidity at the height of a psychedelic experience?=20
> Obviously, you've never dropped, because if you had, you would know=20
> that under such conditions, it is not only possible to believe six=20
impossible=20
> things before breakfast, but that the werewolf you have killed is even no=
w=20
> undulating beneath you, attempting to cover the lethal burn mark between=20
> her lupine breasts.=20

But Nadan has just that instant eaten the egg, and the hallucinogen hasn't=20
taken effect yet.  Let me  give an alternate explanation.

Robert Borski doesn't mention it explicitly, but when Nadan shoots the=20
werewolf, he seem to stop her in the middle of changing back to human,
leaving a face with a blunt muzzle on a human torso.  When Nadan writes=20
"I know now that the thing I killed before Ardis' father's house was real,"=20
he is still hoping that what he just saw, Ardis's head on the torso of the=20
beast he shot Monday night, was a hallucination induced by the fifth egg.=20
He knows he didn't eat the treated egg Monday, since he couldn't have=20
hallucinated Ardis's torso before he knew what it looked like, and so
the beast was real.  But he's afraid to admit to himself that he might not=20
have killed it.

Finally, let me remark that it appears that Ardis may be a con artist who=20
takes tourists into the interior and robs and kills them (or robs them after
the werewolf kills them).  If Nadan does kill her--for he is hallucinating=20
when
he writes "My dead Ardis," it was well-deserved.

 =3D Peter (Stone Ox)

--=20

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