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From: Ron Crown <crownrw@SLU.EDU> Subject: (urth) Wolfe misc. Date: Fri, 24 Mar 2000 12:00:50 Since things are rather slow on the list, I thought I would share a couple of recent extra-genre references to Wolfe which show that our man is making his mark in the larger world. The first is from the book A General Theory Of Love by published recently by Random House. I haven't read the whole thing but on p. 32-33 there's a discussion of "humanity's three brains" which eventuates in this comment followed by a quote from Wolfe. 'From modern neuroanatomy,' writes a pair of neuroscience researchers, 'it is apparent that the entire neocortex of humans continues to be regulated by the paralimbic regions from which it evolved.' The novelist [!] Gene Wolfe makes an identical, albeit lovelier, observation: We say, 'I will,' and 'I will not,' and imagine ourselves (though we obey the orders of some prosaic person every day) our own masters, whhen the truth is that our masters are sleeping. One wakes within us, and we are ridden like beats, though the rider is but some hitherto unguessed part of ourselves. Quick, those of you with Severian-like memory, where is the quote from? The second reference is from a mystery novel by John Dunning with the title Booked to Die. It's about an ex-Denver cop turned used(antiquarian sounds a little high falutin for the kind of books mentioned) bookseller (really) and is full of interesting details about that world of used book dealings, etc. (The author is former used book dealer himself.) The murder victim in the book is a "bookscout" (someone who haunts estate sales, etc. looking for that rare item that will make his fortune). When one of the characters is asked about the last time he saw the bookscout, he replies, 'You mean the bookscout? He knows I don't buy stock from scouts. They want too much for the run-of-the-mill stuff. He comes in if he's got a King or Burroughs, or maybe an early Gene Wolfe." I assume that "Burroughs" is Edgar Rice rather than William S. so Wolfe is still being associated with genre authors. And I suppose he specified "Gene Wolfe" to avoid confusion with Thomas and Tom. But at least he's collectible! (And why didn't I pick up that 1st ed. Shadow in the book store in 1980?!) Ron Crown, D.Phil., M.S.L.S. Reference Librarian Pius XII Memorial Library Saint Louis University crownrw@slu.edu Phone: 314-977-3593 FAX: 314-977-3108 *More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/