I am just finishing a third(?) reading of RTTW. I felt that I was beginning to get some inklings of new insight, and have resolved to re-read the entire BOTN, making marginal notes.
I have a few thoughts and questions, though.
Has anyone worked out a timeline of events. I found that this time, I was able to keep track of the different time sequences better than previously, but on beginning to reread the first book, I started becoming confused just where SilkHorn's time in Gaon fit into the timeline.
Why is Seawrack missing a limb. At one point, I thought Babbie had bitten it off, resulting in some kind of psyche transference, but I'm not so sure of this now.
Does Seawrack's ability to trigger uncontrollable rutting behavior have any thing to do with inter-species breeding experiments?
What is the encrusted thing that climbs aboard Horn's boat?
I thought the broken dome on the island had most likely been a greenhouse for genetic experiments. Possibly human/plant hybrids resulting in the Neighbors. --The Neighbors would then be humans transformed to meet new environmental stresses. Why then, would similar domes be at the bottom of the sea, as Seawrack mentions?
Is Horn made part Neighbor on the island? Or just what the heck happens in the pit?
If the Neighbors allowed the Imhumi to became part human in order to compare the result with the result of Inhumi infused with Neighbor blood, where are the Neighbor/Inhumi?
Why does Horn's son see a Neighbor sitting on a "tree branch" when he looks through Horn's ring?
I think much of this fits together as a breeding or hybridization program. The three races (Neighbors, Humans and Inhumi) are brought together to create hybrids that are desirable somehow to someone. This is accomplished, in part by bringing the colonists from the Whorl to Blue and Green. The Whorl is to be sent away with a cargo of pure human stock, presumably with the idea to repeat the hybridization in another 600 years or so. Possibly this is why the Neighbors have 'gone away' --to preserve remaining pure stock for future hybridization.
Have the Neighbors really gone anywhere if you can find one just by peeping through one of their rings? What is that damn ring anyway? It seemed like Horn left it on Green when he was placed into Silk's body. Then he got a different ring that seem to turn, over time into the original ring.
Is one of the three races the method of hybridization, rather than a base stock? Possibly the Inhumi?
If the gods have hidden in animals, is Echidna in Babbie? Is someone in Oreb? Is Oreb even the original Oreb? Could Scylla be in Oreb for some reason? I'm not sure why I think this last, I seem to remember some connection between the two, possibly from the Long Sun Books. A lot of what happened around Lake Limna seemed fishy to me. I think there is a lot of hints in that portion of the book that I couldn't quite get.
Anything about the ocean-dwelling giants confuses me. I still don't quite get it about Abaia and whatnot. Was he just an alien who was scheming to take over Urth? Where does the Mother (in Blue's ocean) fit into the picture? She seems to be less malign than Abaia and his wives.
I wonder if Mucor is able to assist with the transference of the psyches others--kind of like a human Sacred Window. If she could appear to the blind Pig, she may have offered to release the trapped PasSilk. She may also have been removing some rider from Babbie when Horn returned to Maytera's island with her eye. ...either Echidna, some part of Echidna, or even part of herself...a sort of recording mechanism by which Mucor could plant part of herself, then retrieve it later and access its memory.
I don't doubt that some of these questions have been answered before...searching the Urth archives can be kind of frustrating, though--lots of slogging through barely related material.
Possibly more questions than thoughts...
Brian Lovely
Studio bl
http://www.studiobl.comAh! How nice to get some Short Sun questions. Personally, I'm so "over" the New Sun issues right now.
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Is Horn made part Neighbor on the island? Or just what the heck happens in the pit?
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Has anyone worked out a timeline of events. I found that this time, I was able to keep track of the different time sequences better than previously, but on beginning to reread the first book, I started becoming confused just where SilkHorn's time in Gaon fit into the timeline.
Have you really read "The Short Sun" twice without resolving this? That's a little depressing. Is the end of RTTW 2 years or three years since Horn left Lizard? Are Sinew's sons so "old" because Green has a shorter year or because the Narrator arrives at a different time?
It seems that he can from the the grandmother's story in IGJ where she sees the wizard whose bird says "Beware". She names one of her sons "Incanto" after that wizard and the Narrator is given that name...which is who he is all the time. Another Wolfean cycle where a thing is ostensibly named after something else which is its true identity. If the Narrator was at that grave, he must have gone there because he heard the grandmother's story. Also, remember when Silk sees "Pike's ghost" at the manteon? Did you note that he disappeared not like a gothic ghost but like someone "spirit traveling"? That would also explain how Silk saw Oreb fly out of his bedroom window and disappear when Oreb could not fly at that time.
But for the Narrator to be able to travel in time as well as in space it only complicates the timeline. It doesn't explain the discrepancy in Horn and Hide's account of how long Horn has been gone.
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Why is Seawrack missing a limb. At one point, I thought Babbie had bitten it off, resulting in some kind of psyche transference, but I'm not so sure of this now.
I don't see any reason to doubt that she tried to come aboard the ship at night and Babbie attacked her. Why do you doubt it?
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Does Seawrack's ability to trigger uncontrollable rutting behavior have any thing to do with inter-species breeding experiments?
Well, the Narrator refers to her as "bait" so Mother is certainly trying to lure Horn for some purpose.
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What is the encrusted thing that climbs aboard Horn's boat?
Are you talking about the leatherskin?
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I thought the broken dome on the island had most likely been a greenhouse for genetic experiments. Possibly human/plant hybrids resulting in the Neighbors. --The Neighbors would then be humans transformed to meet new environmental stresses. Why then, would similar domes be at the bottom of the sea, as Seawrack mentions?
Do you have a quote for this?
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If the Neighbors allowed the Imhumi to became part human in order to compare the result with the result of Inhumi infused with Neighbor blood, where are the Neighbor/Inhumi? Why does Horn's son see a Neighbor sitting on a "tree branch" when he looks through Horn's ring?
It seems clear to me that the Neighbors are the trees somehow. They are dryads. That's why when the Narrator meets with the Neighbors in the scene where they give him the deed to Blue, one of them is lying down. he in a fallen tree.
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I think much of this fits together as a breeding or hybridization program. The three races (Neighbors, Humans and Inhumi) are brought together to create hybrids that are desirable somehow to someone. This is accomplished, in part by bringing the colonists from the Whorl to Blue and Green. The Whorl is to be sent away with a cargo of pure human stock, presumably with the idea to repeat the hybridization in another 600 years or so. Possibly this is why the Neighbors have 'gone away' --to preserve remaining pure stock for future hybridization. Is one of the three races the method of hybridization, rather than a base stock? Possibly the Inhumi?
Hmm...you should check out Marc Aramini's Short Sun theory:
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Have the Neighbors really gone anywhere if you can find one just by peeping through one of their rings? What is that damn ring anyway? It seemed like Horn left it on Green when he was placed into Silk's body. Then he got a different ring that seem to turn, over time into the original ring.
I think they have a dual nature with the trees and vines...or is it the Inhumi that have a dual nature with the vines? They can go away in a sense and still be present in a sense, but I don't see that Wolfe has explained how.
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If the gods have hidden in animals, is Echidna in Babbie?
Where do you see that? I think it is obvious that the person in Babbie (at least near the end of RTTW) is Silk. But how that is I cannot say at this time.
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Is someone in Oreb? Is Oreb even the original Oreb? Could Scylla be in Oreb for some reason?
Yes. It is Scylla, the daughter of Pas. Isn't that obvious?
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I'm not sure why I think this last, I seem to remember
some connection between the two, possibly from the Long Sun Books.
I'm curious what that would be. Do tell.
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A lot of what happened around Lake Limna seemed fishy to me.
hee hee
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Anything about the ocean-dwelling giants confuses me.I still don't quite get it about Abaia and whatnot. Was he just an alien who was scheming to take over Urth? Where does the Mother (in Blue's ocean) fit into the picture? She seems to be less malign than Abaia and his wives.
In suggesting a connection between Mother and the aliens of Urth, you have inadvertantly stumbled in to a contentious debate regarding the connection between Urth's solar system and that of Blue and Green. Before we go any further, I'd like to know why you draw the connection between Mother and Abia. (I think the story draws a blatant connection between Mother and the Urth tyrant Scylla whom Typhon's daughter conspired with against her father).
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I wonder if Mucor is able to assist with the transference of the psyches others--kind of like a human Sacred Window. If she could appear to the blind Pig, she may have offered to release the trapped PasSilk.
PasSilk? I believe the god in Pig was Silver Silk. The fact that Pig sees Mucur seems to suggest that she does not actually travel through space but imprints her image on the minds of those to whom she appears.
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She may also have been removing some rider from Babbie when Horn returned to Maytera's island with her eye. ...either Echidna, some part of Echidna, or even part of herself...a sort of recording mechanism by which Mucor could plant part of herself, then retrieve it later and access its memory.
Again...why Echidna?
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I don't doubt that some of these questions have been answered before...searching the Urth archives can be kind of frustrating, though--lots of slogging through barely related material.
Very little in "The Short Sun" has been answered to my satisfaction. Thanks for starting the thread. :-)
~ Crush
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