Date: Mon, 08 Sep 2003 09:42:40 -0700
From: Don Palumbo 
Subject: Re: (urth) Duh! Part 2.

Well, for sure!

--Don

At 12:07 PM 9/7/03 -0700, Lisa Schaffer-Doggett wrote:

>On Sunday, September 7, 2003, at 01:22 PM, Don Palumbo wrote:
>
>>Just dipping in for a moment, but Typhon and Baldanders are the same 
>>person thematically,
>>as Crush suggests, in that they are both the two clearest representatives 
>>of the Ogre-Tyrant of the status quo that it is the task of the hero as 
>>warrior to overthrow.  This comes from Campbell's THE HERO WITH A 
>>THOUSAND FACES, of course, and The Book of the New Sun overall (and 
>>echoed in Urth of the New Sun) is clearly Wolfe's treatment of Campbell's 
>>monomyth, the adventure of the hero, just as the Book of the Log Sun in 
>>itself is his treatment of the generational star ship story.
>
>Don chimes in (am I the real Don, or an eidolon?):
>
>While I don't doubt this is true - and isn't Abaia as the Naviscaput an 
>ogre - I think it is a mistake to identify tBotNS solely as a reaction to 
>Campbell.  I think an equal if not greater share is devoted to Graves (I 
>Claudius, King Jesus, and the White Goddess especially) and there is a 
>huge debt to Borges as well (questions of identity and time).  There is 
>also a major Rosicrucian (I think) aspect to these books, and tBotLS is in 
>some ways a cannibalization of themes and ideas explored in the Soldier 
>novels, which themselves owe a debt to Herodotus and Graves.  The 
>generational star ship aspect is imo the least significant part, a 
>smokescreen so to speak.
>
>This reminds me of a comment by Stephen King about his potentially great 
>but hugely dissapointing Dark Tower series.  He said that his goal was to 
>write the longest single story ever.  I say he's wasting paper (in more 
>ways than one) because in twelve volumes GW has compressed twenty four to 
>thirty six volumes of story to be puzzled out.
>
>
>--


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