silver glass

Chris · 14 Jan 2005, 12:09 · from 2005-January.txt.gz

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From: rasputin_ at hotmail.com (Chris)
Date: Fri Jan 14 12:09:34 2005
Subject: (urth) silver glass
In-Reply-To: <018601c4f849$5985d2a0$4c1e4b0a at vcorp.ad.vrsn.com>
Message-ID: <BAY102-F25C0BBE6F863230BC49427868B0 at phx.gbl>

Well, I did mention Nettle parenthetically, I just didn't feel like 
repeating "Horn and/or Nettle" throughout. But the more I think about it 
this line of thinking isn't just gratuitous and almost can't be accidental, 
either.

The most suggestive thing that immediately occurs to me is that, in Long Sun 
and even more so in his travels on Blue in BotSS, one of the primary devices 
or M.O.'s associated with Silk is the way he can deceive the bad guy by 
suggestion, without actually lying; the person talking to him ends up 
inferring, from Silk's silence on a given subject, from his utterance of 
statements that can be taken in more than one way, or even from his outright 
denial, the very conclusion Silk refuses to lead them to directly. The 
particular aspect where Silk reinforces their suspicion by denying that it 
is true is striking. Now, during the portion of the books purportedly 
narrated by Silkhorn, does he ever actually claim to be Silk? And how is it 
that we come to that conclusion anyway, despite his repeated denials in the 
text that he is Silk (so much so that we come up with explanations in which 
his denial that he is Silk somehow makes it *more* plausible that he 
actually is Silk)? Is the reader exempt from being tricked in the same way 
characters in the book are?

Now, irrespective of Silk's actual existence, we have to accept as a fact 
that the author of BotSS is aware of this device/strategy of... what can you 
call it, leading someone to deceive themselves? If the author didn't have a 
good grasp/mastery of the device themselves, they wouldn't be able to 
portray someone else doing it so vividly and insightfully. So the author of 
the books is ultimately as capable of this kind of deception as Silk is.

There are potentially good motives for such a deception: the book's 
hypothetical audience are the people of Blue, who are in desperate need of 
hope and of a particular message. A real person who is *present*, as the 
source of such a message, has the problem of being able to be killed, 
humiliated, discredited - one of the reasons, incidentally, that I felt so 
strongly that it was unavoidable for Silk to leave at the end of BotSS. 
Silk, present only as he is presented in the books, is an unimpeachable 
source if you believe in him (and, clearly, we all find the portrayal 
convincing enough that we think there was a real Silk). But "if Silk wasn't 
real, we would have to invent him."

There are a lot of textual passages that suggest a real Silk, but 
unfortunately most of them aren't helpful for this particular purpose. The 
passages that are most of interest are the ones that could be verified or 
denied by a character (who is not the author/editor) that could be heard by 
the presumed audience (the people of Blue). This suggests to me that what 
may be the best place in the text to look is Silkhorn's final encounter with 
Remora. That scene certainly suggests that Silkhorn is really Silk, but the 
question is, on close reading, does it tell us this unequivocally? I'm going 
to check this passage tonight; it would be nice if it settled this nagging 
doubt, but I have a feeling that it is going to (deliberately) leave just 
enough ambiguity...

>Chris points out that we can't prove that Silk is anything but a creation 
>of
>Horn's. Why not Nettle as well? We also can't prove that Latro -- even if 
>we
>were to interrogate him -- wrote most of the Soldier stories. He can't
>verify it. I'm not going down that road, but it is one that Wolfe has
>offered to us.
>
> >Why does the story start where it does?  Is this because Silver Silk is
> >Horn's impetus for writing?  Is it just a matter of convenience?  Or is 
>it
> >because he wants to find who he is through the process of writing his
>story,
> >now that he has been commingled with Silk?
>
>Most likely because he didn't have an opportunity to write until he became
>"sultan" on Blue. Anyway, it is Horn who has more of a proven penchant for
>writing than Silk did.
>
>~ Crush
>
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