From: m.driussi@genie.com
Subject: (whorl) Kirk = church
Date: Fri,  4 Apr 97 17:35:00 GMT


[Posted from Whorl, the mailing list for Gene Wolfe's Book of the Long Sun]

Reply:  Item #2027307 from WHORL@LISTS.BEST.COM@INTERNET#

Dr. Gouvea,

(That Cap'n Kirk quote makes me smile!)

Yep, Silk is remembering the Writings, so the Outsider possessing and
enlightening the fortunate man in order to rambo the moneymen is all
Chrasmologically orthodox.  (Long ago someone around here whose name
I should remember was saying that the Writings smacked of Marcus
Aurelius.  Time has come to follow up on that . . . <reaching back
into auxiliary brain> . . . so how 'bout it, Charles Dye?  Could you
give us some links between the Writings and the Meditations?)

To heap more upon this nugget in a vain attempt to make Mount Typhon
out of a molehill: since we know that this is one of the few bits in
the Writings that deal with the Outsider, we can make the leap and
figure that this is the groundwork from which Silk builds his own personal
interpretation of the Outsider--that is, the Writings provide the initial
palette of colors with which Silk paints his eye-witness portrait of the
Outsider.

Nutria,

Thanks for spelling out the Chrasmos thing!  (Some people who are not
at all stupid tried selling me on the Krasis angle, fwiw.)

vizcacha,

It is currently in vogue to disbelieve that map in LEXICON URTHUS--I
myself disbelieve it more than when I published it! <g>  But you know
me--hopelessly lax, muddled, and dreamy--I say the more maps, the
better!  Looking at all those maps of the New World, how they diverge
. . . California is an island!  (Well, it =is=, I'm sure you'll all
agree!)  Even more fantastic are medieval maps of Eurasia--on the one
hand a miracle that Marco could find his way to Acre, nevermind
Cathay; on the other hand a sobering reminder that we ultramoderns
put far too much faith in ridiculously detailed data representations.

To be fair, that map has its strengths and weaknesses.

Anyway, my next-to-be-drawn map, codename NAZCA, ditches all
historicity to portray a fresh new continent raised by (you guessed
it!) terraforming techniques which tie into the nameless entity at
the bottom of the mine at Saltus.  That is to say: much more like
Zothique than ever before!

(Maybe for AE&3?  Yikes, looks like I've already got enough to fill
one up, and we haven't even opened the floodgates of Urth!  Good
thing I've got the cover already done . . . )

Re: scourging the moneylenders, yes, we are all in agreement that
this is a clear link between the Outsider and Jesus Christ of the New
Testament.  It just has an odd twist to it, that's all.  There are
several founders of major religions who started out as ordinary
mortal men and in adulthood suddenly were touched by something from
beyond (right off the bat we have Gautama the Buddha and Mohammed the
Prophet), but that is not the story of Jesus.

Next up: is the Outsider Son (Jesus), Father (God), Holy Ghost, all
of the above, or none of the above?  Because if Outsider = Son, then
enlightenment/possession is as I wrote before; but if Outsider =
Father and/or Holy Ghost, then =maybe= enlightenment/possession of
the fortunate rambo falls under the category of communing with God,
receiving inspiration (or "marching orders" as the chem soldiers would
have it).

Not that I want to get tangled up in theological matters, just that
I'm trying to envision Silk, the Outsider, and the Whorl within the
Christian context.   And as we all know, that Gene is a puzzle
master!

alga,

Not to badger you or anything, but have you finished your urthography
essay yet?  (What, you haven't even =started=?! <g>)

=mantis=

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