The Snootiness of Gene Wolfe

Matt Hughes · 01 Mar 2004, 02:45 · from rec.arts.sf.written.2004.mbox

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From: mhughes at mars.ark.com (Matt Hughes)
Subject: Re: The Snootiness of Gene Wolfe
Date: 29 Feb 2004 18:45:20 -0800
Message-ID: <394d822b.0402291845.58775386 at posting.google.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written
References: <Xns949D9FE6F929Difyouwanttoemailvisi at 199.45.49.11> <c21d3ba0.0402290659.37671483 at posting.google.com> <+tv*P4jeq at news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>

Thomas Womack <twomack at chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote in message news:<+tv*P4jeq at news.chiark.greenend.org.uk>...
> The book that's really impressed me recently is Dorothy Dunnett's
> "Niccolo Rising"; absolutely superb pacing, and a really compelling
> environment, quite substantially thanks to everything being told in
> a well-calibrated omniscient third-person.

To me it's odd that you would find Wolfe's unreliable narrator
infuriating but you're not bothered by Dunnett's practice of having
vitally important matters take place offstage then having the
characters refer to them as if the reader ought to know what they're
talking about.  Gradually, of course, the reader clues in.  I enjoy
the teasing, but I've known readers who find the plot lacunae so
annoying they refuse to read Dunnett.

The Niccolo books just get better and better, by the way.  Dunnett was
as good a historical novelist as Cecilia Holland, and that's saying
something.

Matt Hughes
http://mars.ark.com/~mhughes/

Current story:  Mastermindless (F&SF, March)
Next story:  A Little Learning (F&SF, June)
Next novel:  Black Brillion (Tor, November)

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