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From: "Alex David Groce" <adgroce@eos.ncsu.edu> Subject: Re: (urth) Weer is not dead. Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1998 13:29:17 On Aug 26, 12:12am, William H. Ansley wrote: I agree--I only meant that Bobby is the "best" case I see for someone killed by Weer (and a poor case, although it's easy to see how people blamed him and how it surely changed his life)--and I don't see it as his test, or failure. I'm not sure that there IS an exact turning point where things went wrong for Weer--I think the book is more about coming to understand what did happen to him, not what might have been (although the headrest story does seem suggestive of that...) > In any case, the events that up to Bobby's death seem to be an accident, > unless Weer is lying (always possible) or just mis-remembering to suit his > own sense of what should have happened (as he says he may be doing to a set > of Christmas memories - p. 20 last paragraph and continuing onto p. 21). > But again, who else do we have to ask? > > What I am trying to say here is that I find this event to be a very poor > choice for a turning point in Weer's life, if it is one. Weer is too young > to realize the consequences of his actions and his actions certainly do not > lead inevitably to Bobby Black's death. It really is not a matter of > choosing to push or not push Bobby, but a choice of whether to fight him or > not fight (leaving capitulation or flight, if flight from the attic is even > possible). So it seems to me that we have a boy of five who has to make a > choice to eschew violence or embrace it, a choice that will change his life > forever, if we accept that this is seminal event that forms Weer into what > he becomes. > > Let me try to be clear (for a change) one final time. I think that the > events that followed from Bobby Black's death (Weer's parents leaving for > Europe for two (?) years without him and his time spent under the care of > Aunt Olivia) definitely did have a great deal of influence on the man he > grew into. But, if the outcome of the fight with Bobby was a test for Weer, > I don't think it was a fair one. -- "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free." - John 8:32 -- Alex David Groce (adgroce@eos.ncsu.edu) Senior (Computer Science/Multidisciplinary Studies in Technology & Fiction) '98-99 NCSU AITP Student Chapter President 608 Charleston Road, Apt. 1E (919)-233-7366 http://www4.ncsu.edu/~adgroce *More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/