Gene Wolfe: Book of the New Sun

Charlie Martin · 06 Feb 1986, 13:24 · from net.sf-lovers.1986.mbox

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From: crm at duke.UUCP (Charlie Martin)
Subject: Re: Gene Wolfe: Book of the New Sun
Date: Thu, 6-Feb-86 08:24:52 EST
Message-ID: <6881 at duke.UUCP>
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
References: <194 at analog.UUCP> <3840005 at csd2.UUCP> <11683 at ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> <1090 at watmath.UUCP>

To: mcnc!decvax!bellcore!ulysses!burl!clyde!watmath!jagardner
Subject: Re: Gene Wolfe: Book of the New Sun
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Organization: Duke University, Durham NC
Cc: 
Bcc: 

In article <1090 at watmath.UUCP> you write:
>...so it goes.  Some people can look at the Grand Canyon and feel
>awestruck, while others wonder why they drove all the way to Arizona
>to see a big hole in the ground.  
>
And some of us went to the Grand Canyon and found that the old,
wind-warped timberline pines were far more beautiful, even if the Grand
Canyon is pretty imressive.

I haven't read "Book of the New Sun" because some of the rest of
Wolfe's writing put me off rather badly, and I've only so many hours
in the day.  So maybe I'll try it -- Shadow etc is around here
someplace.  But DesJardins has a good point about the posting to
which he responded -- the general tone *was* "anybody who doesn't
think that Gene Wolfe is Ghod's gift to SF is a schmuck."  And I
think he was justly offened.  Your posting, while more complete
and a far better description of the book(s), *still* comes across
(in my humble opinion [Davis, stop giggling!]) as "if you don't
have a religious experience reading Book of the New Sun, there may be
something seriously wrong with your upbringing."

So cut those of us who prefer a style more like Hemingway a little
slack, okay?

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