Subject: RE: (urth) argh argh argh
Date: Tue, 19 Nov 2002 15:53:21 -0700
From: "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" 

That Subject: line sounds like a pirate trio, eh?

Skipping right to the core of the matter, Marc wrote:

> ... and no one believes that the inhumi are at all related=20
> to the vanished gods, the trees? =20

Whoa, hee-haw, hold on there boyo!  Y're making _far_ too=20
sweeping a statement here.

I believe that most of the list would concede that Wolfe
intends us to recognize that the trees possess some very,
very weird properties, and that the inhumi have some kind
of relationship to them.=20

You've inferred/intuited/iumped to a whole lot of conclusions
about the nature of that relationship (including your idea
that the "vanished gods" -- or was it the VP? -- became the
trees). And some of your ideas seem (to me) more=20
palatable/plausible/probable as I mull them over, live with
them, and in particular as I last reread the SS books with
them in mind. Some of them have seemed less so, but I (at
least) do not feel prepared to dismiss any of your conclusions
out of hand.

When RttW came out, a number of listmembers reacted to it
with what I perceived as undue haste and hostility. I said
at the time that I believed it would take time for the books
to sink in, that judging a Wolfe book on the basis of a single=20
reading seemed to me like a bad idea. (No, I'm not quoting=20
exact words here.) The book came out what, a year and a half
ago? No time at all. NS still yields new insights every time
we dig into it; Wolfe wrote SS with nearly twenty years'=20
additional practice in craft under his belt; I don't suppose
we can reasonably expect it to be _less_, well, crafty.

I suggest only that your attachment to these ideas is as
premature as rejecting them outright. I don't believe we=20
even have the beginnings of a solid handle on the SS=20
books yet.

--Blattid


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