From: "Peter T. Cash" <PTCash@ibm.net>
Subject: (urth) Mani and Thor
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1998 23:22:03 

alga said:

>But yes, with reservations about Erebus, Abaia & co., who are echoing the
>more dualist parts of Revelation.  I said that Dr. Talos's play is
>Manichaean. Which it certainly is--the gothic tradition to which
Baldanders,
>Talos and all horror novelists belong is necessarily dualistic.


"Privatio boni" won't do for Gothic novels? _Necessarily_ dualistic?
Umm...well you are a micro-organism of definite opinions, so I'll just
gently suggest that I'm not convinced.

When you say that the play is "Manichaean", I take it that you mean it
implies a dualistic cosmology or theology. I suppose that it does; but then
it implies lots of things. Indeed, the play struck me as a somewhat tacky,
improvised kitchen-sink composite of just about every apocalyptic-second
creation myth that I'd ever heard. (I'm surprised the Aesir don't put in an
appearance.) I suppose this is in keeping with a play-within-a-novel that is
a "grand sword 'n sorcery revision of the New Testament". I really like that
assessment, by the way.

Sgt. Rock


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