From: Geoff Alex Cohen <gac@cs.duke.edu>
Subject: (urth) Re: Digest urth.v001.n020
Date: Fri, 23 May 1997 13:46:59 


[Posted from URTH, a mailing list about Gene Wolfe's New Sun and other works]

>  So, figuring second-hand experience would just have to do, I
> went over to the People page to read the transcript. But it
> wasn't there. And these lists haven't been filled with excited
> discussion in the interview's wake. Did it occur? Anyone have a
> transcript?

I was there, and got to ask a bunch of questions.  There didn't
seem to be many others in the chat - someone logged on as
"Hierodule", someone named "KevinM" and someone named "Bluejack",
as I recall.

The transcript will be available (according to People) sometime
early next week.

Some tidbits that I recall off the top of my head:

SPOILERS, OF COURSE:
Merryn is "almost certainly" Severian's sister.  

"New Sun" takes place 1000-2000 years in the future (but this can't
be right!).

There are other inhumi on "Whorl."  Something about which planet
they came from, Blue or Green, but I don't remember.

"Short Sun" takes place twenty years after "Long Sun".  Severian
and Merryn may appear.

The next contract he's signing with Tor includes the Short Sun
tetralogy and a collection of short stories.

There was some discussion of Castleview, the story about how
he got the idea for the Guild of Torturers, the unsurprising
revelation that he doesn't watch much TV.  

Authors he recommended included John Crowley, Terry Bisson,
and some other authors.  He hasn't read much Cordwainer Smith.

More will have to wait for the transcript.

Geoff