From: Michael Straight <straight@email.unc.edu>
Subject: Re: Re: (urth) Making sense of Castleview
Date: Fri, 8 Dec 2000 14:10:29 

On Thu, 7 Dec 2000, James Jordan wrote:

>     My thought was that *Castleview* is not SF or fantasy, but "mainstream,"
> but that the events were being constantly cast/perceived/described in mythic
> terms, shifting mythic terms. Thus, the key would be to figure out what
> actually is happening at the everyday-world level, and then explore how
> these mundane events might be also "participating" in those mythic
> archetypes which the narrator has superimposed on them. As with the Emerald
> City (in the Baum book), Wolfe is giving us colored glasses with which we
> are looking at quite ordinary events, so that the ordinary world becomes a
> "castle" in this "view." Thus, something ordinary is going on in the "wild
> ride" sequence, but various people see different "wild rides" going on; one
> sees cowboys, as I recall.

As much as I like this idea, I don't think it's the book Wolfe wrote.  
I've seen a couple interviews with him about it and he always talks about
the joke of Morgan seeking an heir of Arthur and it turning out that
everyone alive is an heir of Arthur.  I'd think if what you suggest is
true he would have at least hinted that everyone seems to be missing the
real-world mundane thing going on.

-Rostrum


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