Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2002 17:31:46 -0700
From: maa32 
Subject: (urth) blattid - doubled limbs

No doubt I'm repeating myself again, but for Blattid: I think I did a pretty 
good job reconciling all the differences between the descriptions of Urth 
(saltier sea, different color, etc.) in the last archive, and I've gone over 
the doubled limbs ad nauseum. There are a ton of things that point toward them 
being the same, and there are a few BIG things that point toward them being 
different.  Remember that Krait says "the biggest mysteries are the most 
obvious ones".  I think Wolfe had a lot of fun hiding Blue as Earth through 
the biographical Plant Engineering premise. And a few other clever tricks ("Ah 
ha! they will never be able to figure out that Blue is Urth even though they 
are both big blue flooded planets with a Green satellite! I am the master of 
misdirection." Can't you see Wolfe doing that?) I am very pleased with my 
explanations, and I can't look at the text in the same way ever again no 
matter what anyone else brings up; it all fits for me.  All the little details 
keep adding up to it even with a precursory glance (especially in the first 
chapter when Horn claims the maize has everything to do with where they are 
right now - how odd is that parallel?) And once you realize Babbie is Horn 
there is no other way to read his treatment of Hoof in the last couple 
chapters of Return.  And where did he first leave Silk?  The end of On Blue's 
Waters where he says goodbye and then the narrative changes 180 degrees into a 
positive, absolutely didactic and good narrator. He doesn't even relate the 
story of Green and the sewers in first person - because he has less of Horn in 
him than ever before.  And what hastens that transition? Sleeping under a huge 
tree, like the ones on Green.  And what brings back the Vanished People? Horn 
falling in their pit.  And why? Because they are made from him.  And why is 
the secret of the inhumi important? It indicates life from Green uses the 
blood of other species to evolve with HERITABLE genetic traits within one 
generation, just like the trees.  And why does Wolfe go over inhumi breeding 
habits ad nauseum at the end of Return to the Whorl? Because it explains 
polyploidy in simple (very simple) animals and plants. And one of those 
metanarrative statements is in the text there claiming the story is very 
important when Juganu tells it.  I don't know about you, but that story bored 
me out of my mind.  It was important for its genetic veracity.  I will not 
bend, nor move an inch.  The only concession I am willing to make (for me; I 
could care less how anyone else really reads the text - everyone should have 
room for personal interpretation; mine just fits everything I read in the text 
for me)is that maybe Horn and Silk are not quite forerunners of the Green Man 
(maybe they didn't receive any genetic material from their tree experience).
Ok.  Sorry for so much repetition.  Of course, believe what you want. I just 
wanted to share my thoughts with everyone.
Marc Aramini



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